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 Tim leaves the North Col and heads up the North Face with Russell’s words ringing in his ears. If he doesn't get his act together, Russell will order him off the mountain for the second year running.
But Tim is so determined to prove Russell wrong that he pushes himself too hard and runs out of steam halfway to the next camp. He's struggling badly and no one's in a mood to give him a second chance. Twenty four hours behind Tim and Team 1, the second summit team, including Danish asthmatic Mogens Jensen and 71-year-old Japanese climber Katsusuke Yanagisawa, is also on its way to the summit. Mogens is still determined to summit without bottled oxygen, but Russell doesn't think he's strong enough and worries that the hugely increased risks of climbing without oxygen might prove fatal. As Mogens and the others get ready to leave Advance Base Camp, they're confronted with yet another reminder of how dangerous climbing Everest can be. An Irish mountaineer is brought to see expedition doctor Monica Piris with excruciatingly painful snow blindness. He went blind just below the summit and it’s taken days to get him down the mountain. He never thought he’d make it back alive. "Scariest thing I did yesterday coming down from 8,300 [meters] to North Col," the climber says. "I passed a few dead bodies, rolled over a few actually because I couldn't see them." Tim eventually makes it to Camp 2 at 24,500 feet and decides to go on bottled oxygen a day earlier than everyone else to give himself the best possible chance of summiting. His tactic works and the next day he storms up the mountain, leaving his teammates wondering why they aren't on oxygen, too. Mogens is left agonizing over the same decision. He's made it to Camp 2 but he suffered a bad asthma attack during the climb and his confidence is at rock bottom. Russell tries yet again to persuade him to use oxygen, but Mogens needs time to think. He's failed three times already. "It's my job to let people like Mogens go as far as they can without actually killing themselves," says Russell, "but it makes me pretty nervous." Team 1 fights their way to Camp 4 at 27,500 feet inside the Death Zone, where their bodies are slowly dying from lack of oxygen. It's a grim place at the best of times, but as they arrive, they're met with the sight of a dead climber lying in the snow. "Oh dear, there's a body there," agonizes Rod. "I've just seen a body — I want to go, it's bad karma. If he can die, we can die." They'll leave Camp 4 at midnight to begin an 18-hour Summit Day. But as they prepare for the toughest day of their lives, another team is in dire straits. A team of climbers has become separated from each other high on the mountain. It's chaos — their teammates don't know where they are, but they want Russell to help. Russell pulls a Sherpa off the summit team to search for the missing climbers. Eventually one is found, but the other remains missing and is presumed dead. PHOTO: Tim Medvetz at North Col. Hikers use ropes put up by Sherpas and must use ladders to cross a dangerous crevasse along the way. |
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