The helping hands on Everest
Too busy (work) to blog today; in my spare time I'm putting together Everest Part 2 and in the meantime, have a read of this of an account from Everest (from EverestMax):
"I continued up the North Col and things did not get any better. I came across Vince – a Canadian we had met who was attempting Everest without oxygen. Sarah had tried to help him but he could not move up or down the mountain because we was too breathless. He clearly had HAPE and if left to his own devices was going to die on the mountain. He had no colleagues with him and his sherpas had abandoned him. I too tried to encourage him to climb the 10m up to the North Col – he couldn't. Eventually I had to clip him into my harness and pull him up to the North Col. His tent was too far away so I just put him in nearest empty tent. Meanwhile Dom had tried to mobilise help from the 7 Summits team - they refused to help despite being a large organisation. Dom then brought oxygen from our camp about 150m away which I used to treat him along with Dexamethasone and Nifedipine. Once he was stabilised I continued the climb to our camp before returning later to check on him with sleeping bag, food and fluids. I spent a nervous night before checking on him again in the morning with a fresh oxygen cylinder. I was relieved he was still alive but he was still very weak and needed rescuing. His trekking company, Monterosa, were very unhelpful. They had promised Nick, who had been liasing with them at ABC, that they would send up a Shepa team with oxygen to bring him down. One sherpa did arrive, but refused to help and instead went to Camp 3 to dismantle it. I'm not sure whether he had personal differences with Vince – but still - the guy was dying. Salvation came in the form of a Spanish team who were also clients of Monterosa. I have to say, although I'm bloke, they were all fit good looking guys. They had summited two days earlier but showed no signs of the physical deterioration that other summiteers did. They heroically got Vince down to ABC where he was seen by Jonathan, a doctor from the Irish team that Nick had organised."
With friends like these ...
"I continued up the North Col and things did not get any better. I came across Vince – a Canadian we had met who was attempting Everest without oxygen. Sarah had tried to help him but he could not move up or down the mountain because we was too breathless. He clearly had HAPE and if left to his own devices was going to die on the mountain. He had no colleagues with him and his sherpas had abandoned him. I too tried to encourage him to climb the 10m up to the North Col – he couldn't. Eventually I had to clip him into my harness and pull him up to the North Col. His tent was too far away so I just put him in nearest empty tent. Meanwhile Dom had tried to mobilise help from the 7 Summits team - they refused to help despite being a large organisation. Dom then brought oxygen from our camp about 150m away which I used to treat him along with Dexamethasone and Nifedipine. Once he was stabilised I continued the climb to our camp before returning later to check on him with sleeping bag, food and fluids. I spent a nervous night before checking on him again in the morning with a fresh oxygen cylinder. I was relieved he was still alive but he was still very weak and needed rescuing. His trekking company, Monterosa, were very unhelpful. They had promised Nick, who had been liasing with them at ABC, that they would send up a Shepa team with oxygen to bring him down. One sherpa did arrive, but refused to help and instead went to Camp 3 to dismantle it. I'm not sure whether he had personal differences with Vince – but still - the guy was dying. Salvation came in the form of a Spanish team who were also clients of Monterosa. I have to say, although I'm bloke, they were all fit good looking guys. They had summited two days earlier but showed no signs of the physical deterioration that other summiteers did. They heroically got Vince down to ABC where he was seen by Jonathan, a doctor from the Irish team that Nick had organised."
With friends like these ...
Labels: Everest
posted by Rob Crawford at 2:43 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home