Every year thousands of people come to the foot of Everest to admire this natural wonder. Hundreds of people embark on a dangerous path to its top. Not everyone who sets out on the route has the courage and strength to reach the end and conquer the highest point of the planet. And not everyone will come back.
Third pole of the Earth
The summit of Everest, she is Chomolungma, she is Sagarmatha. Height 8848 m. Above 7925 m. The so-called. "Death zone". Here the temperature drops to minus 60 degrees. With hurricane winds reaching 200 km / h, it feels like minus 100-120 degrees. Thin air, because of which each breath brings in three times less oxygen than at sea level. Intense solar radiation. In these conditions, a person simply cannot live. Add to this the "classic" mountaineering hazards: landslides, avalanches, drops from steep slopes, falls into crevices. It is not surprising that the "third pole of the Earth" remained impregnable for many years. The North Pole has already been conquered, the South Pole has fallen, and still no man's foot has set foot on the summit of Everest.
Because he is
"Why are you going to Everest?" asked George Mallory. “Because he is,” the climber replied. In the 1920s, the British began to lay siege to Everest. Mallory was a member of all three expeditions in 1921, 1922 and 1924. On June 8, 1924, George Mallory and Andrew Irwin went to storm the summit. They were last seen 150 meters from the crown. Mallory and Irvine did not return back.
It is still debated whether the British have passed the remaining 150 meters. 150 m on Everest is a lot. Mallory's body was found in 1999. He lay on the slope, as if hugging the mountain. Irwin's body was never found.
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Then there were expeditions in the 30s and 40s. And only on May 29, 1953 Sherpa Norgay Tenzing and New Zealander Edmund Hillary climbed to the top. Officially, they are considered the first people to conquer Everest.
The queue for the storming of Everest
Followers followed the pioneers. One expedition followed another. They climbed Everest at night, in winter, without oxygen, new routes appeared.
Since the early 1990s, the conquest of the highest peak of the planet has turned into a tourist tour for wealthy ladies and gentlemen seeking thrill. Companies have appeared that are ready to take on the organization of an amazing trip. Permission to climb from the authorities of Nepal ($ 10,000), oxygen tanks ($ 1,000 each), hire a guide, Sherpa guides, the necessary equipment - the conquest of Everest will cost you about $ 65,000. The firms promise an unforgettable experience. When you return, you will amaze your friends with unique photographs taken on top of the Earth.
The number of tourists who come every year to Nepal and China to see Everest is in the tens of thousands. At least 500 each season challenge the white giant. There are congestion and traffic jams on tourist routes! And few of the wealthy tourists take the document seriously, which each of them must sign. In the document, each member of the group confirms that they are aware of the mortal risk of climbing and goes to it on purpose. Many people perceive the signing procedure as part of a fun game. Insight comes at times too late.
Travel without return
As of February 2014, 4042 people have climbed the mountain over the past 60 years. More than 250 died. There is no exact figure. The statistics of "defectors" are not kept, many go in wild groups, some go alone, so the death toll is undoubtedly much higher. Until the 90s, the mortality rate when trying to climb reached 34%, today the figure has dropped to 4%.
Hurricane wind, incorrect timing, frozen valve on an oxygen cylinder, exhaustion, hallucinations, avalanches, altitude sickness, heart failure, hypothermia - there are plenty of reasons to die on Everest. Newcomers also perish, and experienced climbers perish.
Cemetery on Everest
Stunning mountain landscapes, mountains of garbage left by their predecessors and … dozens of corpses open up to the eyes of the next conqueror of Everest slowly climbing up the mountain. Lying, sitting, huddled in a fetal position, hanging upside down over an abyss - they meet tourists in the same positions in which death overtook them.
The bodies lie for decades. Wind and snow gnaw corpses to the bone, the longer the body lies, the less flesh on it. Some, in bright jackets and shoes, have already become landmarks. The corpse of Indian Tsewang Palzhor has been lying for almost 20 years. Few people know his name, but for every climber "green boots" are 8.500m.
The evacuation of each body is a costly and technically complex operation. The helicopter does not rise to such heights - in the rarefied atmosphere, the blades rotate and cannot find support for themselves. The body can only be lowered on the hands. This should be done by 8-10 trained rescuers, carrying the deceased through the passes and gorges. This is not only difficult, but also deadly: a step to the right or to the left - and several new ones will be added to the old corpse. Therefore, dead climbers continue to "meet" the next conquerors of Everest.
But not only the dead are left behind. Often they leave alive on snowy slopes.
Abandoned to die
In 2006, the world was shocked by the tragedy of David Sharpe, who climbed the mountain on his own. At an altitude of 8500m. his oxygen cylinder failed. More than 40 people walked past him. Among others was New Zealander Mark Inglis, who made an unprecedented climb with prostheses. To stop for him meant to disrupt a unique trip. He didn’t do it. Inglis reached the top and became a hero with a tarnished conscience.
The Discovery TV crew stopped, photographed the dying David and even tried to interview, and then moved on.
Sharpe's case is, scary to say, not the only one. In 1996, a group of Japanese climbed Mount Everest. On their way there were Indians in distress who had endured a high-altitude storm. The Japanese passed by. When they came back down, the poor fellows no longer needed help. The Dutch group walked past another climber in trouble. Exhausted, he could no longer scream, only whispered and waved his hand after the departing.
In 1998 Sergei Arsentiev and his wife Francis climbed Mount Everest. During the descent, they lost each other. Op went down to camp, she didn't. Francis died for two days. Several groups passed her. Some stopped. To deal with the fate of a dying woman meant giving up the ascent, so the groups moved on.
Special ethics at an altitude of over 8.000 meters
Everest has its own laws. One of them says: if you don't have the strength to go further - die, and don't ask for help. Climbing Mount Everest is for many a dream that they have lived for many years. An expedition is being prepared, a team is gathering, funds are earned together, money is begged on their knees from sponsors, every dollar is set aside, you have to infringe on yourself literally in everything.
And just a stone's throw from the top - the unfortunate. Poorly prepared for the expedition or a fatal coincidence, from which no one is insured? Who cares. Staying close to him means giving up your dream: there is no extra energy, no time reserve, no extra oxygen. And there won't be a second chance. Never. And what can be done? It is impossible to evacuate him, he will die here anyway, in 5 hours or in 10.
After all, he knew what he was doing. Probably saved on Sherpas and equipment, trained a little, did not turn back when there was an opportunity - so he got what he deserved. And the group moves on, carefully stepping over the dying man.
People remain people
And yet there are other examples. At almost the same time as David Sharp was dying, Jamie McGuinness and his team of Sherpas carried a climber in trouble from the summit to base camp for 36 hours. In the same place where Francis died, a Ukrainian guy was rescued. More than 40 people from various expeditions took part in the rescue.
In 1996, two commercial groups were caught in a blizzard. Anatoly Bukreev, an employee of one of the groups, went down first. (His task was to prepare the camp for the arrival of the other participants of the ascent.) At the appointed time, only a part of the group returned, having lost 4 people during the descent, including the leader. Boukreev went to the camp to collect volunteers to go in search. Nobody volunteered. Anatoly went alone. Twice (!) He went into a blizzard and brought 3 people. These three people owe their lives to him. The film Everest was made about these tragic events in 2015.
The freezing Frances Arsentieva, among others, was seen by a married couple Woodhall from the UK. Ian and Kat abandoned the ascent they had dreamed of for many years and left the route. For two hours they tried to pull out a woman in trouble. At last it became clear that either they would leave here alone, or they would stay here forever with Francis.
A year later, they returned and saw that the woman's body was still in the same place where they left it. They had been preparing the next expedition for 8 years. They returned to bury Frances - they threw her body into the abyss, away from prying eyes.
Arsentieva's husband Sergey managed to get to the camp in a blizzard and waited for his wife. When the climbers who came down said that they saw Frances in trouble, he took oxygen tanks and went upstairs. What he could do alone, at an altitude of over 8.000m. even if I found her? Save? Definitely not. Could only die next to her. Probably, this is what he was striving for, he could not forgive himself that he had lost his wife during the descent. Sergei's body was found only a few years later.
Just business
Today Everest is a multimillion-dollar business, where dozens of large and small firms are organizing a tour to the top of Chomolungma. The company takes care of everything: takes the participant to the base camp, organizes the path and intermediate camps, escorts the client and insures him all the way to the top and back. In pursuit of profit, absolutely anyone who is able to pay the required amount is accepted into the group.
Accepted are people who have never been mountaineering before, confident that all the shortcomings can be compensated for by the thickness of the checkbook. And the organizing firms are in no hurry to dissuade them from this. On the contrary, in their words, climbing Mount Everest is akin to an ordinary tourist walk. And now blind people, people with health problems, with amputated limbs, old people and children go to conquer the summit. Is it any wonder then that rescue helicopters in the Himalayas have become an integral part of the local flavor?
But not every victim can be saved. As mentioned, helicopters have a ceiling above which they cannot climb. Alas, Everest is much higher. The tourists themselves cannot save, they have neither the strength nor the necessary experience for this. Amateur rescue operations threaten only with new victims. Therefore, when the group leader decides to leave the victim, thereby condemning him to death, he proceeds from simple arithmetic: one corpse is better than two or more.
What tour operators don't talk about
As one of the mountaineer-guides said, in the office of each tour company there should be a poster: 1. Climbing Mount Everest is extremely life-threatening. 2. If something happens to you at an altitude of over 7.000 m, you will perish and no one will help you. 3. If at this height you meet an unfortunate person begging for help, you will pass by and live with it for the rest of your life.
But none of the companies will ever put up such a poster, rightly believing that such "advertising" will have a harmful effect on business. Therefore, every year more and more groups climb the slopes of the mountain, maneuvering between the corpses and pretending that all this is in the order of things. And every year there are more and more of these groups, which means that the number of dead people along the routes will continue to increase.
Climbers
In addition to lovers of exotic travel, dozens of climbers climb to the top of Everest every year. They have been preparing for the ascent to the highest point of the Earth for many years, having previously stormed less eminent peaks, because they know that mountains do not forgive even the slightest negligence.
At the moment of their triumph, standing on the top and looking at the clouds floating below, they remember that only half of the way has been passed and the descent is no less dangerous than the ascent. They never say “conquered the top”, but only “climbed to the top”, because you cannot conquer mountains. For those who think otherwise - corpses on the route as a formidable warning.
"Secrets and Mysteries" No. 24/2015
Klim Podkova
