Chapter 22 Chapter 20 The Point of Geneva

△Elevation 7894 meters, May 12, 1996 AM9:45 * Inexperience has one great advantage for the alpinist: he is not bogged down in tradition or precedent.In his view, everything is very simple, and he always chooses the direct solution in the face of difficulties.This, of course, would frustrate his quest, sometimes with disastrous results, but he did not know this when he set out on his expedition.Maurice Wilson, Earl Denman, and Klavs Becker︱Larsen all know little about mountaineering, otherwise they would not set off on their hopeless pursuit.They don't care about skill, and a fearless will drives them to go the long way.

Unsworth <Everest> Walt Unsworth, Everest □□□ Fifteen minutes after leaving the South Col on the morning of Sunday, May 12, I caught up with my teammates who were about to descend from the top of the Geneva slope.The scene was miserable, everyone was extremely weak, and it took an unbelievably long time to walk to the snow slope below just a few tens of meters.The most distressing thing is that the scale has been severely reduced. Three days ago, we climbed this area with eleven people, and now there are only six people left. I made it to Hutchison at the end of the line, who was still on the spire of Geneva Slope, ready to rappel.I noticed he wasn't wearing goggles.Although it was cloudy, the murderous ultraviolet light at this altitude would soon make him snow blind.Pointing to my eyes, I shouted in the howling wind: Hutchison!Your goggles!

He replied weakly: Oh, yes.Thank you for reminding.Hey, since you're here, can you check the equipment for me?I'm so tired I can't think.Keep an eye out for me, thanks a lot.I checked his gear and immediately saw that the shackle was only half locked.As soon as he was attached to the fixed rope, the weight of his body would undo the hook and send him down the Lhotse Face.I pointed this out and he said: Yeah, that's what I'm worried about, but my hands are too cold to lock them up.I took off my gloves in the bitter cold wind, quickly fastened the safety harness around his waist, and let him climb down the slope of Geneva after the others.

He hooked the safety line chain to the fixed line, dropped the ice ax onto the rocks, and began the first rappel.I yelled: Hutchison!your axe! He replied loudly: I am too tired to carry it, so just stay there.I was too tired myself to argue with him or pick up the ice ax for him, but hooked the rope and followed Hutchison down the steep flank of Geneva's sloping slope. An hour later, we arrived at the top of the Yellow Belt, and all mountain friends climbed down this vertical limestone cliff carefully, forming a bottleneck.I waited at the end of the line, and several Sherpas from Fisher's team caught up with us, including a grief-stricken, nearly half-mad Jiang Bu.I put a hand on his shoulder and told him I was sorry about Fisher.Jiang Bu beat his chest violently and said in tears, "I am a broom star, I am a broom star."Fisher died, and it was all my fault.I am a broom star.Blame me.I am a broom star.

At around 1:30 in the afternoon, I dragged my tired body into the No. 2 Camp.Although it is actually still at high altitude (6492 meters), this place feels very different from the South Col.The deadly wind stopped completely.Instead of shaking and worrying about frostbite, I sweated in the scorching sun.It appeared that my life was no longer in danger. Our dining hall has been changed into a field hospital, hosted by Hansen, a Danish doctor of the Duff team, and Kammler, an American client and doctor of the Burrison expedition.I was drinking tea at three o'clock in the afternoon, when six Sherpas embraced the bewildered Gao Minghe and walked into the tent, the doctor quickly took action.

They immediately laid him down, undressed him, and inserted an IV needle into his arm.Kammler examined his frozen siblings, which were as dead white as a dirty bathtub, and said calmly: I have never seen such severe frostbite.He asked Gao Minghe if he would allow him to take photos of his limbs for medical records. The Taiwanese climber smiled and agreed.Like a soldier displaying his battle wounds, he is almost proud of the shocking wounds on his body. Ninety minutes later, while the doctor was still treating Gao Minghe, Brixius' voice came over the radio: We are halfway bringing Withers down.We'll take him to Camp Two before dark.

It took me a while to realize that Bridgers was not talking about bringing down the dead body, but that he and his companions were bringing down Withers alive.I can't believe it.When I left him at the South Col seven hours ago, I feared he wouldn't survive the morning. Withers was given up again, but he refused to accept his fate.Later I heard from Yadance that not long after he gave Withers the Texan injection of dexamethasone, Withers recovered amazingly.At around 10:30, we changed his clothes, put on the safety harness, and found that he could stand up and walk.We were all very surprised.

They walked down the South Col, Jadance clinging in front of Withers, telling him where to set foot.Withers put one arm on Jadance's shoulder, and Bai Lisen followed closely behind, holding on to Withers' safety harness. The three of them shuffled cautiously down the mountain.Yadance said: "Sometimes we have to help him a lot, but he's walking really well, it's amazing. At an altitude of 7620 meters, that is, above the yellow belt limestone cliff, they met Westers and Shaw, who took Withers down the steep rock in twos and threes.When they arrived at Camp No. 3, Brishaws, Williams, Gustafson, and Cigala all rushed forward to help. Eight healthy climbers brought the crippled Withers down the Lhotse face. It took a fraction of the time it took me and my teammates to walk down earlier that day.

I heard that Withers was coming down, so I went to my tent, put on my hiking boots weakly, and walked slowly up the hill to meet the rescue team.I had expected to meet them at the lower part of the Lhotse mountain face, but after walking up for twenty minutes, I was surprised to see the whole team.Although Withers was pulled by a short rope, he walked on his own.Bridgers and his party escorted him down the glacier at a fairly rapid pace, but I was in such a miserable state that I could barely keep up. Withers was placed in the medical tent with Gao Minghe, and the doctor began to undress him.Dr. Kammler saw Withers' right hand and exclaimed, "My God!"His frostbite is even worse than Makalu (Gao Minghe).Three hours later, I crawled into my sleeping bag while the doctor carefully thawed Withers' frozen limbs with a jug of warm water under the light of a headlamp.

The next morning (Monday, May 13), I left my tent at dawn and walked the four kilometers across the deep crevasse of the West Cirque to the edge of the Khumbu Icefall.Following Curt's radio instructions from base camp, I was looking for a flat surface to serve as a helipad. Curt has been relentless these days on a satellite phone to arrange for a helicopter to fly over from the lower side of the West Cirque so that Withers doesn't have to climb down the precarious ropes and aluminum ladders of the Ice Falls. His hands hurt so badly. Climb down Too difficult and too dangerous.In 1973, when an Italian expedition carried supplies from the base camp with two helicopters, it landed in the West Cirque.However, the flying height of the helicopter is limited, so it is very dangerous to do so, and one of them crashed on the glacier.In the twenty-three years since, no one has attempted to land higher than the Khumbu Icefall.

But Curt was very persistent, and thanks to his efforts, the U.S. embassy finally persuaded the Nepal Army to use helicopters to rescue people in the West Ice Cirque.Around 8 a.m. on Monday morning, I was still searching for a barely usable landing pad among the seracs dotted around the edge of the icefall, but couldn't find it, when Curt's voice rang on my radio: Strong, the helicopter is on its way.Will be there anytime.You'd better find a landing place quickly.I was trying to find some flat ground above the glacier, and I happened to be hauling Weser on a lanyard with Jadance, Perryson, Gustafsson, Brescius, Westers, and the rest of the IMAX team Go ahead. Bridgers has been making films for many years, with brilliant results. He has been shooting with helicopters many times. He immediately found a helipad next to two ice crevasses at an altitude of 6,053 meters.I tied Hada to a bamboo stick to serve as a wind indicator, and Bridgers used a can of marshmallows as paint to draw a giant X in the snow in the middle of the tarmac.Gao Minghe reappeared a few minutes later, lying on a plastic slab and dragged down the glacier by six Sherpas.Before long we heard the clatter of helicopter propellers beating against the thin air. The olive green B2 Squirrel helicopter (with all non-essential fuel and equipment removed) piloted by Nepal Army officer Lieutenant Colonel Kekhchu, failed in both dives at the last minute.But the lieutenant colonel tried for the third time, and finally waddled the squirrel to rest on the glacier, with its tail hanging above a bottomless crevasse.He turned the propellers to full speed, kept his eyes on the instrument panel, and raised a finger to indicate that he could only carry one passenger.At this altitude, a slightly overweight takeoff will crash the plane. Since the frostbite on Gao Ming and his feet had thawed in the second battalion, he couldn't walk or even stand, so Breschers, Yadance and I agreed to let him leave first.I yelled to Withers over the roar of the helicopter's turbines: Sorry, maybe he can fly again.Weatherstar nodded appreciatively. As soon as we lifted Gao Minghe into the back seat of the helicopter, the plane tentatively rose into the air.As soon as the skid was lifted from the glacier, Lieutenant Colonel Kechchu immediately moved the fuselage forward, flew into the sky over the edge of the icefall like a small stone, and disappeared into the shadows.Then the West Cirque was dead silent. Thirty minutes later we were standing around the tarmac, discussing how to get Withers down the hill, when there was a faint rattling sound from the valley below.Slowly, the sound became louder and louder, and finally the little green helicopter appeared in sight again.Ke Hequ flew up the West Cirque for a short distance before turning the plane around with its nose pointing downhill.Then without hesitation, he parked the squirrel on the cross line drawn by the fruit candy again, and Bridgers and Jadens pushed Withers into the plane.Seconds later the helicopter took to the skies, skimming the west shoulder of Everest like a weird metallic dragonfly.An hour later, Withers and Gao Minghe were already receiving treatment in a hospital in Kathmandu. After the rescue team dispersed, I sat alone in the snow for a long time, staring at my boots, trying to make sense of what had happened for the past seventy-two hours.How did things get so out of control?How could Harris, Hall, Fisher, Han Sen and Yasuko really be dead?But no matter how hard I try, I still can't get an answer.The scale of this disaster is far beyond my imagination, and my brain is so short-circuited and completely confused.I gave up trying to sort it all out, put my backpack on and headed down into the frozen witch world of the Khumbu Icefall, nervous as a cat, through the labyrinth of crumbling seracs for the last time.