A Day to Die For: 1996: Everest's Worst Disaster - One Survivor's Personal Journey to Uncover the Truth (14 page)

The lodge, through Ang Kanchi, offered emergency, albeit basic, medical facilities. A Red Cross and Himalayan Rescue Association sign was prominently displayed outside. Amongst the equipment and medications she held to aid with the more serious problems of altitude sickness was a Gamow bag. This was a manually inflatable compression chamber that could effectively reduce the height a person was at by a considerable margin; it was equipment that had to be used with caution, knowledge and expertise. The main medical centre for treating such life-threatening ailments in the area is that of the Himalayan Rescue Association clinic at Pheriche, manned by volunteer doctors. This better-equipped facility is some three to four hours further up the valley: a distance that in certain circumstances might be too far when more immediate treatment is required to stabilise a patient’s condition.

It was around 10 a.m. the next day when Paul and I set out from the Rhododendron Lodge towards Pangboche. The conversation between us centred on other members of our expedition. In all fairness, it was probably me that steered the topic in that direction. I confided in Paul that I had an uneasy feeling about Ray. I couldn’t really rationalise or explain, but I felt that I would rather not climb with him.

In an expedition, you cannot reasonably expect to be friends with everyone; rather, you build safe working relationships. Not wanting to climb with a particular person didn’t present any real problem. As a matter of course, the team would be split up at various camps on the mountain throughout the expedition. In climbing, instincts and gut feelings are normally best not ignored, although usually these are more to do with your surroundings than other climbers.

I’d been in a situation three years earlier, during a post-monsoon expedition on the North Ridge of Everest, that had firmly taught me to trust my instincts. They had saved the life of a French climber and possibly my own.

It was early in the season when Thierry Renard and I were descending towards the North Col from a foray up to 24,500 feet on the North Ridge. With Thierry leading, we were struck by an unexpected squall that reduced visibility to almost nothing. The ground and the sky merged. It was impossible to distinguish where one finished and the other began.

As we crept slowly down to escape from the clutches of the blizzard, through a dense mist of fine swirling snow, my senses and instincts told me something was very wrong. Rather than ignoring them I shouted to Thierry over the howling wind, ‘I think we’ve gone much too far to the right!’

These words must have confirmed a doubt that Thierry was already having in his mind. His ghostly white figure, covered in a layer of fine snow, stopped dead in its tracks. As he turned his head, which had been stooped to lessen the pain from the biting particles of snow and ice being driven forcibly by the wind, the look of confusion on his heavily bearded face was all too apparent.

‘Graham, you take over!’ he screamed back.

Looking down at my feet I was alarmed to find myself straddling a fresh crack in the surface of the snow, about half an inch wide. To make matters far worse than just being disorientated, we had managed to get ourselves onto a high-risk avalanche slope. Our problems now had to be dealt with in terms of priority. First we had to get back onto more solid footing. I turned almost 90 degrees to the left of our current course, and my instincts led us back up onto the centre of the ridge and safer ground. Taking account of which side of the ridge these avalanche-risk areas existed, I steered us on a downward course.

As we reached the North Col, the squall cleared as quickly as it had arrived. What we saw in the snow higher on the ridge was more than just a little bit sobering. When I’d shouted to Thierry and he’d asked me to take the lead, he had been no more than five or six steps from walking off the edge of the North Ridge: an edge we couldn’t see in the white-out conditions. With the broad ridge curving gently down on the right-hand side for the first 80 feet, Thierry, in the poor visibility, had been drawn, almost sucked, in that direction. We’d actually walked onto the overhanging cornice, hence the tell-tale crack in the snow. He’d been seconds away from taking a 2,500-ft plunge to almost certain death. I may well have unwittingly followed, or if the cornice had broken off it would have taken us both at the same time. The footprints in the snow bore witness to how close we’d come – tracks that remained untouched by the weather for at least two weeks, ones that everybody saw.

My instincts were not something I was about to ignore. For the duration of the expedition, I would not climb with Ray. Anyone else in the team was fine. Once said, I didn’t raise the subject again, not even with Ray, as this would have caused bad feeling from which no one would benefit.

No sooner had I told Paul my concerns about Ray than Brigitte caught up with us. Unaware of the conversation Paul and I’d just had, she announced there was one person on the expedition she did not want to climb with. I knew exactly what she was going to say.

Brigitte paused for a moment and said, ‘Graham, I’m surprised you haven’t had the same feeling.’

I didn’t reply but turned briefly and looked at Paul. I didn’t need to say anything.

Within our team in the spring of 1996, Paul, Brigitte, Michael and I knew one another from previous expeditions. I’d climbed with each of them at different times and got on well with all three. The mutual respect between us was coupled with an understanding of one another’s backgrounds. I suppose it was easier for us in this regard. Among those who’d only met one or two of the other climbers on the team before, new friendships and understandings had to be forged.

Paul had a passion for the Everest region that was beyond question. At the age of 18, he had proposed, co-organised and co-led a 47-strong team in an attempt to clean up much of the rubbish and debris that had been wantonly discarded around Everest Base Camp over the previous decades. A well-read and youthful-looking man with an infectiously amusing personality, he was prone to becoming exuberant during his conversations. Despite being only 26, Paul could spin a yarn or tell a story to match the best of them. Beneath this, his self-confidence levels waned at times, as though he felt overshadowed by some of the ‘superstars’ present at Base Camp. He was always a pleasure to have around, an asset to any group.

Michael, in 1995, had been catapulted to fame in Denmark by becoming the first person from his country to climb Everest. Although a very capable climber, he was a modest person who kept his private thoughts to himself. Socially, he came across as an uncomplicated, affable person, who, as far as I could tell, was both liked and respected by nearly everyone.

Brigitte, who had long, straight blonde hair, was originally from Belgium but had taken Australian citizenship some years earlier. Plain speaking and volatile at times, she took no nonsense from anyone. She was a strong climber with a personality to match, and I liked her immensely. If Brigitte had any fears, she certainly didn’t show them; she was both determined and focused.

At the grand old age of 41, I was the oldest climbing member of the team and the only one, apart from Henry, with children of my own. The family circumstances that I held in common with many of our Sherpas undoubtedly brought with it their respect. This was not least because several of them, including Kami, had been introduced to Catherine in Kathmandu at the end of our 1995 expedition. Having reached the summit that year, a few weeks after my 40th birthday, my age, experience and family life were hopefully considered an asset for the proposed undertaking.

Being surrounded by such companions on the ten-day trek to Base Camp brought with it the sense of an extended social gathering, which helped to distract us from the necessary and sometimes uncomfortable chore of acclimatisation. Having sufficient time for old friends and new acquaintances is something that seems so difficult to find back at home, where the ever-present pressures of work lurk in the back of your mind. Such demands didn’t exist out there. The climb, the common cause and the summit were the binding focus.

By lunchtime, Paul, Brigitte and I had arrived on the outskirts of Pangboche, a small village high in the Solu Khumbu where most of our Sherpas lived. The dry-stone walls on either side guided our narrow trail alongside traditional stone buildings. They were roofed with the nearly ubiquitous corrugated metal sheets that in bygone days would have been inch-thick slabs of overlapping stone. A few homes still retained this original feature.

Kami’s house, set slightly back from the main path, had a 20-ft high flagpole embedded in the ground outside. To this, a single one-foot-wide white prayer flag, of almost the same height as the pole, had been fastened. The cotton flag, hand-printed in black with Buddhist prayers, emitted snapping sounds as it tightened and slackened against the continual changes in the wind. Inside, the blessing of our expedition by monks from the nearby Pangboche monastery was well under way. For Kami, this five-day ceremony was a great honour and a sign of the respect he now commanded within his village.

As Sirdar of an Everest expedition, he was in a position to offer well-paid employment to those in the area: a responsibility he took very seriously. This work, which was highly paid in comparison with many alternatives in the area, did not come without risk. The Sherpa people, through the previous loss of friends and family in pursuit of this line of work, were well aware of this fact. The appeasement of the gods through dedication, offerings and prayer brought protection from the dangers they knew lay ahead. The custom, in return for this blessing, was for the Sirdar and his wife to provide the monks with a continuous supply of food and tea: a costly and time-consuming undertaking for this rural family.

As Paul, Brigitte and I entered the upper floor of Kami’s house we could see, in the half-light, ten or more Buddhist monks clad in burgundy robes. They were sitting cross-legged on the built-in bench that ran around two sides of the room and on which thick woollen rugs had been placed. Directly in front of them, several long tables draped with cloths had been arranged end to end. Before each monk lay an open book of prayers from which he recited in a low continuous chant that fitted perfectly with the moment. The air was heavy with the fragrance of burning incense. The curling white trails of smoke rose through beams of sunlight that entered via small rectangular panes of glass that occupied part of one wall. Large beaten-copper vessels and cooking pots, blackened over many decades by smoke escaping from the poorly ventilated stove, hung from rafters; the level below us was occupied by livestock – similar to the rural houses of Britain in medieval times.

I had the sensation of time standing still. My thoughts were that if this scene had been transported back a thousand years or more, the only real inconsistencies would have been the modern packaged food and our presence.

As guests, we were offered tea. We sat motionless for almost an hour, entranced by the mysterious atmosphere. Although we were made very welcome and invited to stay longer, this ceremony was for the Sherpa people and their deep-rooted Buddhist beliefs. It was their time not ours.

Over the next two days, our team moved up to the sparsely populated outpost of Chukung. Situated several miles further on, near the head of the valley, this sprawling settlement was more importantly 1,200 feet higher in altitude than Pangboche. Here we found accommodation in a simple stone lodge with dried-turf floors and a dormitory constructed almost exclusively from plywood. The purpose for our visit to this somewhat uninviting and windswept location was an acclimatisation scramble planned for the following morning up Chukung Ri, a modest rocky peak of 17,700 feet, about 2,600 feet higher than the lodge we now occupied.

During our extended lunch, which spread well into the afternoon, Henry turned to me and asked quietly, ‘Graham, can you go up and see if we will be needing plastic boots on Chukung Ri tomorrow?’

Under normal dry conditions, strong walking boots would have been enough. However, early in spring, Henry’s concern was there might still be a considerable amount of snow or ice on Chukung Ri’s slabby ridge. If this were the case then climbing boots and crampons would have been needed for a safe ascent and descent.

Henry’s request didn’t require a second thought. I was happy to have something useful to do rather than sitting around forcing down gallons of tea to stave off the ever-present possibility of a headache. With windproofs, water, a couple of Mars bars and a head torch stuffed into my rucksack, I headed off up the hill. It’s times like this that I enjoy the most: the space to think, content with my own company and the remoteness of my surroundings.

It seemed no time at all before I was standing on top of Chukung Ri’s rocky summit, gasping for breath at this new-found altitude. In front of me, a couple of miles away, stood the South Face of Lhotse, towering two miles vertically upwards from my current location. This view came as a stark and sobering reminder of the height we had yet to gain over the coming weeks. Lhotse, although the fourth-highest mountain in the world, is still 1,000 feet lower than Everest: a margin that put our goal at the very limit humans could survive, and then only for a few hours. Fortunately, our planned ascent of Everest, via the South Col, was nowhere near the technical difficulty of the face that stood before me: one that was classed by many as being amongst the most difficult and dangerous climbs in the world.

The sight of a thick damp mist rolling in along the valley floor brought an abrupt end to my distant thoughts. Gathering myself up, I turned and made a quick but surefooted descent back to the lodge.

I arrived to find my companions still drinking tea and warming themselves around a hot stove. In all, the round trip had taken me a little over two hours. Sitting down next to Henry, I said, ‘We don’t need plastics.’

‘Not even on the top section?’ he asked.

‘No, it’s clear all the way to the top,’ I replied.