Blind Descent Page 12
One of the things that often surprises people about climbing is how intense the solitude can be. That’s one of the draws for me, because in the mountains, the constant chaos and distractions of life are stripped away. The silence at high altitudes is so profound it can seem almost deafening at times. The quiet is broken only by the occasional gust of wind or the sound of distant avalanches and falling ice. It’s a powerful way to reset the mind, but it can also push climbers to the tipping point between sanity and insanity.
The positive side of being away from family is that it helps you appreciate them more—but that can also be the negative side. Some climbers abandon their goal partway through out of intense homesickness, and then after returning home, they wish they’d stuck it out and taken the opportunity they’d been saving for and training for.
I could feel myself teetering on that brink as I climbed, torn between missing my family and wanting to accomplish this goal I’d been striving toward. I thought about the six-month deployments I’d endured in the Navy. I’d done two stints in the Persian Gulf—one in 1995 and the second in 1997. Those six-month deployments felt long, crammed onto a carrier with 5,000 other people. The only things that got me through were faith and focus. Each day was different based on the missions we were assigned, but I tried to stick to a routine as much as I could: workouts, meals, training, college courses (which I took on the ship), and prayer. It also helped to dream about the future and plan things JoAnna and I would do together once I returned to the States. I tried to use those same strategies now—keeping a consistent routine and remembering who was waiting for me back home.
Camp II is located at the base of Lhotse Face. From camp you can look straight up and see Camp III, the Yellow Band, the South Col, the South Summit, and the true summit. It didn’t look like any of the pictures I’d seen because I was at such close range. From this vantage point, the peak looked deceptively attainable. But then I took a slow walk across camp, and I was brought back to reality. I realized that I still had about two miles of vertical feet to go, and at this slow-motion rate, that sounded like a long distance.
As I made my way into our cooking tent, Lakpa smiled and said, “Brian, you are strong. Like a Sherpa without a client!” I was flattered—not just because of his words but because of the source. This was coming from someone whose people were the strongest climbers in the world.
After tea, spicy noodles, and a short rest, we packed up to head down again. The descent through the Western Cwm was similar to the Muir snowfield on Mount Rainier, which I’d climbed countless times back home. The terrain was flat and descended gradually, so I was able to step up my pace. I almost wished I’d brought my snowboard along so I could bomb my way down in a few minutes flat!
Back at Camp I, I stuffed my remaining gear into my backpack and rehydrated. I chatted with Bill and Pasang for a few minutes while Lakpa and another Sherpa continued ahead of me. Then I carefully moved out of Camp I across the multiple crevasses. I caught up with both Sherpas and started walking with them. They picked up the pace, and I did my best to keep up. We ended up making record time through the icefall, returning to base camp in just two hours.
I had to stay at Everest base camp for the next four days to acclimatize, and I knew that being inactive for so long could be one of the most maddening parts of the trip for me. After so many days of intense physical activity, my efforts came screeching to a halt.
I thought back to my days of SERE training. As challenging as the physical tests were, the mental drills were even more intense. One of the segments of our training was sustaining enemy torture. We spent two days in a mock POW camp, where physical and mental interrogation tactics were used on us, including waterboarding. We were marched for more than a mile to the “prisoner camp” and placed in individual boxes with dank-smelling canvas sacks over our heads. We had to sit in a specific upright position—with our legs crossed and our arms extended, and with our elbows resting on our knees. It was an incredibly uncomfortable position that caused almost immediate cramping. All through the day and night, we were accosted by the blaring sounds of repetitive music, dripping water, and the crying of babies. The intention was to break us down mentally.
We were brought into interrogation rooms and tortured to find out how far we would go before we broke and gave up classified information. Then we were tempted with a softer approach—in a comfortable room with attractive female interrogators. Our mission was to resist and stick to the code of conduct, no matter the approach—even and especially when the enemy wasn’t adhering to the rules.
At one point I was pulled into a room, slapped, and slammed against the wall. Then I was locked in a small box, which was barely large enough for me to fit in. Later, when the door was opened, they found me fast asleep—utterly unfazed. I was yanked out and given another round of beatings and then brought back to my main box with the others.
After a week of misery, an American flag was raised and the national anthem was played, indicating that we had been rescued and were heading home. We stood at attention, many of us with tears streaming down our cheeks. I’d lost about 15 pounds in a matter of days due to lack of food and the stress of the interrogations.
If I could survive a week of hearing the constant sound of dripping water in my cell, I told myself, I can handle a few days of rest at base camp.
On the first rest day, I decided to do some much-needed laundry. A base camp Sherpa brought out two bowls of hot water—one large and one small. As soon as I doused my soiled clothing, it began to snow. I quickly washed, rinsed, and repeated until the water was a disgusting shade of brown. I rigged a line between the tents with some climbing cord so I could hang my clothes.
After eating lunch in our dining tent, I returned to find my clothes frozen solid, with 6- to 10-inch icicles hanging from them. I had to be careful since the clothes would easily snap if I mishandled them—I didn’t have much in the way of wardrobe options. I brought my clothes inside the tent and allowed them to slowly thaw out for the next two days. Even after my clothes were washed and dried, they didn’t feel clean or comfortable like they would back home after cycling through my indoor front-load washer and dryer.
The next day the weather turned relatively warm, so after two weeks of not showering, I decided to use the opportunity to get clean (or at least cleaner). It took four Sherpas to haul barrels of water and pound on the electrical heating device, but they finally got it working. It felt like heaven! After so many days of baby-wipe baths, my greasy hair had reached a point where it could stand up in any direction with a gentle comb of my hand. After a couple of shampoo treatments and a good rinse, I might as well have been Fabio, whipping my tender, brown locks in slow motion from side to side in the shower tent. Who would have ever guessed that being clean would be such a major morale boost?
•
I used the rest days to catch up my blog entries. I wrote them in the warmth of my tent and then hiked 30 minutes outside of camp to my “Internet cafe” to post them. There was a lot of press that year about how there would be 3G Internet coverage at Everest base camp for the first time, but when I arrived, I found that that assessment wasn’t entirely accurate. It was true that Nepal’s 3G service provided coverage from Gorak Shep, a village a few miles down the Khumbu Valley. The 3G towers were powered by walls of solar panels, but they were spotty in bad weather, and at night they were shut down to conserve power. We could have worked around those limitations, but the worst part was that the towers weren’t strong enough to send a 3G signal into base camp. We received EDGE coverage, which was sufficient for cell phone calls, but it was unreliable for Internet access.
To upload blog entries, send e-mails, add pictures to social media sites, or make video calls, I had to hike 30 minutes out of base camp and climb out onto a ridge. I would sit on a large, flat boulder, which was the only place I’d found where I could get fairly consistent coverage. The view from the rock was breathtaking. From that vantage point, I could see the icefall
crawling down the mountain, the summit of Mount Everest, and the surrounding Himalayan peaks.
I tried to schedule my calls for times when JoAnna and the kids were awake, which ended up being the start of my day and the end of theirs. I was 12 hours and 45 minutes ahead of the time zone back home in Washington, and I was glad to have my time conversion spreadsheet. Prior to my trip, I’d mapped out the time differences between home and Everest, and it was handy not to have to recalculate each time I called.
One morning as I sat on the rock trying to get the Internet to load up, I thought, I’ve been away from my family for a whole month now. That caused a lump to form in my throat, but it was motivating to think about how close I was to reaching my goal. It won’t be long before I’m home again, I coached myself.
Not only was I eager to see my family, but I was also ready to eat some real food again. At first the food had been interesting and part of the adventure, and I’d tried to make the most of it. But by now, I dreaded each mealtime. It wasn’t our cook’s fault—I was eating plenty, and he was doing a good job considering the limited access he had to fresh food, refrigeration, and cooking appliances. But after so many consecutive days of eating Spam and dal bhat (a Nepalese curry dish consisting of rice and lentils), I was ready for a nice big cheeseburger, a steak, a Starbucks Caramel Macchiato—anything, really. I was even looking forward to the flight food we’d get from Thai Airways on the way home. It wasn’t even the food itself that I craved; it was the freedom to be able to get whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted it. I had to force myself not to lie in my tent and dream of food back home, since I knew that would only depress me more.
While I didn’t want to dwell on food, I couldn’t resist posting this entry on Climbing magazine’s blog.
April 28, 2011
If someone could please drop ship a carne asada burrito from Roberto’s in San Diego or a Double-Double Animal Style from In-n-Out Burger, I sure would appreciate it![6]
Almost daily I heard the thump of helicopter blades as another person was evacuated from base camp. Some climbers were facing life-threatening high-altitude problems, such as excess fluids in the lungs or cerebral edema. In other cases, clients paid a cool $5,000 to get a quick ride out of a dream that had turned into a nightmare.
Finally, after four days at base camp, it was time to head up to Camp III to finalize our acclimatization process. On April 30, Bill, Veronique, her two Sherpas, Pasang, and I climbed up the Khumbu Icefall to Camp I, where we would spend the night. Our little group spread out as we climbed at our own pace. My pace was getting faster, since the terrain was now a lot more familiar to me. Although the mountain was constantly changing, I knew where certain hazards were and recognized various crevasses. One area had been wiped out by a falling serac, and now instead of having horizontal ladder crossings, there were vertical ladders we used to climb down into the crevasse, hike across the bottom, and then go back up the ladders to get out.
I made my way up through the icefall and turned the corner above the mass of ice sculptures to see a cluster of yellow and orange tents. I’d made it to Camp I. While I waited for the others, I fired up the stoves to melt snow, which we’d use to replenish our water bottles. Then I set up the tent Bill and I would share at the top of Camp I and got to work stowing all my sharp items (crampons, ice axe, poles, and pickets) outside the tent. Once everyone else added their gear to the cache with mine, we’d mark it with a bamboo wand and a flag. That way if a snowfall came overnight and our gear got buried, we’d be able to find it quickly.
I woke up early the next morning, eager to get moving. The rest of the group wasn’t ready yet, and my toes were getting cold, so I set out for Camp II a little earlier than the others. I listened to my headphones and kept my head up, taking in the beautiful 360-degree views. The climb felt smooth, and before I knew it I was at Camp II.
We spent two nights at Camp II, also known as advance base camp (ABC). The setup at Camp II was similar to Everest base camp, with individual tents, a bathroom tent, and a dining tent staffed by our amazing cook, Dawa, who always served us with a smile. He made great fried potatoes and pancakes; plus, he usually had a can of Pringles, which always hit the spot! Like most of the other Sherpas, he had a family back home that worried about his high-altitude job.
“Dawa, you are a very good cook,” I told him. “But does your wife wish you’d do something else that’s less dangerous?” I asked.
Dawa’s face broke into a contagious smile. “I want to climb Mount Everest someday.”
•
Later that evening, Mount Everest claimed its first victim of the year on the south side. One of the climbers had experienced a severe case of edema a few days prior, shortly after his summit attempt. He had collapsed when he was nearing Camp III and died almost instantly. News travels quickly through the Sherpa community, but at this point we didn’t have any way to verify what we’d heard. I later learned that this climber’s name was Rick Hitch, and he was from California. It was strange to be cut off from media access, knowing that people back home likely had more information than we did about something that had happened just a few hundred yards away from us.
We were taking the south route up Everest, through Nepal—the same route Rick had taken. It’s probably a pretty even split between climbers who take the south route and those who take the north route. More deaths have occurred on the north side, but there are many different variables that have contributed to those fatalities, and the risks run about equal on both sides. The north route is easier at the lower sections but slightly more dangerous higher up due to the extreme winds and colder temperatures, plus the technically difficult Second Step, which is a straight-up ladder climb at 28,000 feet. There’s also no chance of helicopter rescue on the north route. The south route is difficult since you have to traverse the Khumbu Icefall, which is arguably the most dangerous area on either side due to the constant falling hazards. Plus, there’s the long summit night and the Cornice Traverse, with its nearly two-mile drop on each side.
The next day we walked by a tent just 200 yards from our camp. The tent was windblown and eerily lifeless, and it took a moment for it to dawn on me that it had belonged to Rick. They had temporarily stashed his body there until the rest of the group descended. I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d have been able to help him survive if I’d been closer, but I suppose that was all the search-and-rescue training in me.
Training to become an air rescue swimmer is intense—approximately 60 percent of candidates drop out or are asked to leave. But for me the challenges were worth it. There’s something compelling about the duty of risking your own life to save someone else. The AIRR motto is simply, “So others may live.” As rescuers, we didn’t really think about the sacrifice involved—we just took off in search of people in need. Now we were in the mountains, not over the ocean, but the same sobering truth remained: life is fragile.
The following day we watched a couple of climbers being taken on a helicopter recovery mission from the base of Lhotse Face. We heard that several other climbers were evacuated down the mountain with oxygen, while another client fell on the bergschrund—a massive ice formation that separates from the mountain—and reportedly broke his wrists.
That’s not the kind of news you like to hear at 21,000 feet above the ground.
“Lord, please bring healing and peace to those who are leaving today,” I prayed. “And please comfort Rick’s family, wherever they are.”
I knew JoAnna would worry if she heard the news about the fatality and wonder if I’d been hurt. I didn’t have cell coverage at higher elevations, so I borrowed Veronique’s satellite phone.
“Hi, honey!” JoAnna said when she heard my voice. Her voice echoed with the time delay.
“Hey, sweetie. I’m borrowing a satellite phone, so I need to be quick. There was a reported death, but I wanted to let you know that my whole team is fine. I didn’t want you to worry.”
“Thanks for letting me know,” she sai
d. “I miss you. The kids miss you. But we’re staying busy. Yesterday—”
“Honey, I’m sorry, but it’s not my phone. I have to go, but I’ll call you in a few days. I’m heading up to Camp III and then I’ll be back at base camp. Don’t worry—I’ll be safe.”
I hated to cut her off and not hear about what she and the kids were doing, but I knew how expensive satellite minutes were, and I didn’t want to abuse the favor. After all, I might need to ask again.
“I love you,” JoAnna said. “Please be safe.”
As I hung up, I thought about the anxiety JoAnna had experienced when I was preparing to climb Denali. Our church was doing the Soul Revolution challenge at the time—a 60-day challenge to help us align our thinking with Christ. We both had little timers that went off each hour throughout the day as a simple reminder to pause and connect with Christ.
The challenge just happened to fall during my two-and-a-half-week expedition on Denali, and it helped to know we were both going through the same thing even though we were so far apart physically. We felt connected to one another through Christ, and it helped JoAnna get over her anxiety to remember that God was watching over both of us. It helped me, too, reminding me that no matter how many miles away I was, God was protecting my family. I hoped that same sense of closeness with Christ was sustaining her now.
•
The following day we packed up and began our climb to Camp III. The weather fluctuated from cold to colder, and then, out of nowhere, we’d hit pockets of air that were insanely hot. But by the time I’d strip down a layer, it was freezing again. I had my full down suit on at Camp II, and then when the sun hit the ice, I started overheating, so I dropped the suit down halfway, tying the arms around my waist. I wanted to be careful not to overheat, as I knew that would drain my energy quickly. And if I was sweating and it suddenly got cold, I could put myself at risk for hypothermia. I was glad to have layers and clothing with side zippers for ventilation.