Life, Death, Crowds and Races at the Top of the World

Last weekend signaled the end of the climbing season for Mt. Everest, the mountain's summit attempts more heavily regulated than the San Ysidro border crossing. At the same time, in spite of such bars to summiting as fees in the area of $60-$100k (not including flight or even all expenses), the necessity of clearing out at least a month and a half not including previous time sacrificed to train for the thing, and the brief window of success, not to mention the very real chance of death, people are making Everest look like a fuckin' lift line. I mean, look at Ralk Dujmovitz's picture here of, like, 200 people in line up the Lhotse Face for the last summit push; it makes this "badass" ascent of the toughest peak in the world look more like Yosemite tourist trap Half Dome than the top of the world.

Yet in spite of all the comfort, the whole Doctor/Lawyer-paying-100k-for-sherpas-to-drag-his-ass-up-to-the-summit-for-bragging-rights thing, Everest is still dangerous as shit, still one of the most extreme endeavors a person can endure. About 1 person dies for every 25 who summits. Which is actually higher than the Allied death rate for D-Day (beach stormers and paratroopers both).


This season was relatively less fatal, 4 climbers dying May 19th due to congestion as they ran into another 200 people descending, 1 sherpa dying from falling into a crevasse due to standard sherpa practice of not hooking into fixed lines when crossing bridges and whatnot. But all told since 1953 there have been about 300 deaths on Everest, the deadliest day being the expedition detailed by many people but none better than Jon Krakauer in INTO THIN AIR. So it's still nothing to laugh at.


That. Being. Said. Just like everything else in this modern era, this true tentpole, the highest point on the planet, a big bragging right and certainly a real-life Successories poster about reaching the summit in spite of the risks and sacrifices or some shit, has been achieved by enough ambitious men (and women) that they're trying to find new ways to make it interesting for the real pros. No longer is it cool just to summit for hardcore alpinists. Now you gotta do it differently from everybody else, add some extra challenge to it. Like when Kelly Slater said he free-surfed Teahupoo a little drunk, just to see what it was like and ended up messing up his ankle but still won Pipe Masters. All just because he can. 

Along those lines, here's a sampling of a few ways lunatics have been trying to make Everest more challenging this year:

• In an article I wrote a little over a month ago I talked about Nat Geo's double expedition to the summit both via a rarely-used route and via a large group with Mayo Clini running medical tests. Not sure how many (if any) of you followed this but it was extremely elucidating to see how a summit push unfolds in real time.
• Lots of waiting around.
• Scenic vistas unmatchable by anything in normal life tinged with the very real missing of loved ones back home that's part and parcel of an expeditionist's life
• Plans change - the three-man team attempting to summit the Western ridge got a setback when teammember and photog Cory Richards, the first man to summit a peak over 8k meters in the winter, started showing symptoms of altitude issues. When they got him down to a hospital in Kathmandu they showed no rhyme or reason for this lapse but he wasn't allowed to continue on, leaving Conrad Anker, arguably one of the greatest alpinists of our time, to try and find a new climbing partner for the extremely difficult and deadly Western Ridge summit. He found one and started getting ready for it when, alas, due to a bad winter the couloir he needed to climb wasn't in any condition to climb. So instead he was gonna go up the South Col with the other group on Friday but pleaded exhaustion. But a champion never to be counted out, he ended up summiting it with Jangbu Sherpa Saturday, and without oxygen, no less.
• You lose weight in a way that would make Angelina Jolie die of jealousy.
• No black man has ever summited Everest. Phil Henderson was attempting to be the first on this trip but, alas, he had to turn back.

• Since summiting without oxygen is a true test of an alpinist, it should be no surprise that the first to summit without oxygen this year was the Swiss Machine himself, Ueli Stieck. Just another notch in his ever-burly high-alpine belt.
• Climber Chad Kellogg has attempted to set the Everest speed record - trying to beat Pemba Dorjee Sherpa's 2004 record of making it from Base Camp to summit and back in 8 hours and 10 minutes. Might I add that Chad Kellogg has lost his wife, his brother, his climbing partners in pursuit of climbing. He failed his first attempt, was supposed to try again last weekend but can't find anything - I assume that means he failed. Poor guy, just can't catch a break.
• They're running Marathons around Everest. Just a few days ago the Tenzing Hillary (named of course after the first two to summit Sagarmatha, Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay Sherpa) Marathon was run @ 5300 meters above sea level, just a long hop from Everest Base Camp. Eat your heart out, P. Diddy.

And having been such a bad and weird winter with only about a 2 week window for summiting, this year's excitement has come and gone in the blink of an eye.

Ahh Everest. The great mountain.  And, I have to give them credit at Nat Geo, most of these pictures on this post here are from their "Field Test: On Everest" feature and if you haven't checked out the photo gallery you really need to.

Here's to ambitious inspiration born at the still-extreme-in-spite-of-all-the-damn-crowds top of the world. Happy Friday.

- Ryan