\u201cI am getting quite im but I know that high altitude mountaineering is a waiting game,\u201d Helmut said when I was about to leave. However, like any other team on the mountain, the Himex crew will have to wait for the strong winds to die down in order for them to reach the summit, and come back down again.\u00a0 \u201cThe weather window has to be big enough for everyone to get back down safely as the summit is only half way,\u201d Russell always emphasises.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
In a very somber and serious note, the Khumbu Glacier has now returned four bodies of climbers who have died on Everest Expeditions. Eric Simonson posted a touching tribute to Ang Phinjo Sherpa who was a friend and colleague for IMG expeditions. He was killed April 21, 2006, in the lower Icefall near the first ladders when a huge serac collapsed.<\/p>\n
Jangbu and I have worked together since 1991 and I know this had weighed on him and the family, so it is a big relief for everyone to finally recover Phinjo and close the loop. Phinjo is the only sherpa to die working for IMG; other than this incident, we have had only a few minor injuries over the years. He and the other two sherpas were doing everything right that fateful day, but they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time when their luck ran out. So far this year the Icefall has been very benign, with very few collapses or avalanches. It reminds us to be vigilant, as we prepare for our final rotations and summit\u00a0bids.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
From the North, Bill Burke once again posted an audio report detailing a quick evac for an ill Sherpa and also that David Liano has left for his summit bid. We can safely assume other teams are also attempting this window over the weekend on that side, but there are no other confirmed reports. Last report was of the large (30 person) Chinese teams leaving Base Camp a few days ago. Hopefully they are able to get higher to set the lines.<\/p>\n
I’ll post more on the South side attempts as it develops.<\/p>\n
Climb On!<\/p>\n
Alan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The summit push is on and the south is pushing hard. Teams are at camp 3, Sherpas are at the South Col with tents and oxygen ready for the summit push. If the weather window holds, per some forecasts, teams should arrive at the South Col mid-day Saturday, Nepal time and start their summit bids later that evening, May 15th. This would have summits on Sunday morning, May 16th starting perhaps as early as 6:00Am. Of course all of this assumes the winds die down enough for them to climb. The competition continues and now is a bit ugly with feelings of deceit designed to trick the competitors. The Sky Climber team down at base camp report Carina R\u00e4ih\u00e4 at the South Col prepared to go for the summit anytime and Anne-Mari Hyryl\u00e4inen has climbed to Camp 3.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[259,147,545],"tags":[283,285,298,320,40,367],"class_list":["post-17700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2010-coverage","category-everest","category-weekend-update","tag-ang-phinjo-sherpa","tag-anne-mari-hyrylainen","tag-carina-raiha","tag-eric-simonson","tag-img","tag-peak-freaks"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17700","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17700"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17700\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17700"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17700"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17700"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}