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summit How triumph turned to tragedy on K2â€™s deadliest days

Pat Falvey

Pemba Gyalje Sherpa

Beyond Endurance Publishing

CONTENTS Acknowledgements

Expeditions and Climbers

Glossary of Terms

Preface 17 Foreword 20 Maps

Prologue 24 The Waiting Game 28 May – 20 July

Weather Window 20 July – 31 July

A Deadly Ascent 31 July – 1 August

124

Triumph Turns to Tragedy 1 August – 2 August

176

Trapped in the Death Zone 2 August – 3 August

210

Survival and Rescue 3 August – 7 August

250

Tragedy Becomes Controversy 7 August – 14 August

274

Epilogue 292 List of the Dead

295

Postscript 296 Note on the Sources

297

Bibliography 299 Endnotes 301 Index 307

CONTENTS Acknowledgements

Expeditions and Climbers

Glossary of Terms

Preface 17 Foreword 20 Maps

Prologue 24 The Waiting Game 28 May – 20 July

Weather Window 20 July – 31 July

A Deadly Ascent 31 July – 1 August

124

Triumph Turns to Tragedy 1 August – 2 August

176

Trapped in the Death Zone 2 August – 3 August

210

Survival and Rescue 3 August – 7 August

250

Tragedy Becomes Controversy 7 August – 14 August

274

Epilogue 292 List of the Dead

295

Postscript 296 Note on the Sources

297

Bibliography 299 Endnotes 301 Index 307

EXPEDITIONS & CLIMBERS Norit K2 Dutch International Expedition (Cesen route) Wilco van Rooijen (leader) Gerard (Ger) McDonnell Cas van de Gevel Pemba Gyalje Sherpa Court Haegens Mark Sheen Jelle Staleman Roeland van Oss

Norwegian K2 Expedition (Abruzzi route) Cecilie Skog Rolf Bae Lars Nessa Oystein Stangeland

South Korean Flying Jump Expedition (Abruzzi route) A team: Kim Jae-soo (‘Mr Kim’, leader) Hwang Dong-jin (deputy leader) Park Kyeong-hyo (climbing leader) Go Mi-sun (‘Ms Go’) Kim Hyo-gyeong (‘Little’ Kim) Jumik Bhote* Pasang Lama*

B team: (Abruzzi route) Lee Sung-rok Song Gui-hwa Lee Won-sub Kim Tae-gyu Kim Seong-sang Son Byung-woo Tsering Bhote* ‘Big’ Pasang Bhote*

French-led K2 Expedition (Cesen route) Hugues D’Aubarède (leader) Nick Rice Peter Guggemos Karim Meherban* Jehan Baig* Qudrat Ali*

American K2 International Expedition (Abruzzi route) Mike Farris (leader) Chhiring Dorje Sherpa Chris Klinke Eric Meyer Fredrik Sträng Chris Warner Timothy Horvath Paul Walters

Serbian K2 Vojvodina Expedition (Abruzzi route) Milivoj Erdeljan (leader) Predrag Zagorac Dren Mandic Iso Planic Miodrag Jovovic Shaheen Baig* Mohammad Khan* Mohammad Hussein* 13

Norwegian K2 Expedition (Abruzzi route) Cecilie Skog Rolf Bae Lars Nessa Oystein Stangeland

B team: (Abruzzi route) Lee Sung-rok Song Gui-hwa Lee Won-sub Kim Tae-gyu Kim Seong-sang Son Byung-woo Tsering Bhote* ‘Big’ Pasang Bhote*

French-led K2 Expedition (Cesen route) Hugues D’Aubarède (leader) Nick Rice Peter Guggemos Karim Meherban* Jehan Baig* Qudrat Ali*

American K2 International Expedition (Abruzzi route) Mike Farris (leader) Chhiring Dorje Sherpa Chris Klinke Eric Meyer Fredrik Sträng Chris Warner Timothy Horvath Paul Walters

Serbian K2 Vojvodina Expedition (Abruzzi route) Milivoj Erdeljan (leader) Predrag Zagorac Dren Mandic Iso Planic Miodrag Jovovic Shaheen Baig* Mohammad Khan* Mohammad Hussein* 13

Singapore K2 Expedition (Abruzzi route) Robert Goh (leader) Edwin Siew Cheok Wai Ang Chirring Sherpa* Jamling Bhote*

Italian K2 Expedition (Abruzzi route) Marco Confortola (leader) Roberto Manni Mohammad Ali* Mohammad Amin*

Independent climbers Hoselito Bite (Serbia) (Cesen route) Alberto Zerain (Spain) (Abruzzi route)

GLOSSARY OF TERMS Acclimatisation – the process by which organisms adjust and adapt to different climates, environments and altitudes. Adze – the flatter end of an ice axe used for cutting footsteps and clearing ice. Alpinist/alpine climbing – refers to a self-sufficient approach to climbing in which climbers carry all of their equipment and supplies as they ascend a mountain, often without recourse to fixed ropes, high-altitude workers or oxygen. Belay – a method of securing a safety rope to an anchor point and feeding the rope through a crab to aid the safe progress of a climber.

French TGW K2 Expedition Yannick Graziani Christian Trommsdorff Patrick Wagnon

Bivouac – an improvised temporary natural construction or shelter used for sleeping and often used to refer to sleeping in the open air. Carabiner/crab – a spring-loaded metal loop or catch for attaching ropes to fixed lines.

Sunny Mountain Chogori Expedition George Dijmarescu (leader) Teodora Vid Mircea Leustean Rinjing Sherpa Mingma Tunduk Sherpa

Cerebral oedema – a condition resulting in the swelling of the brain tissue due to the presence of excessive amounts of fluid. Chorten – a Buddhist shrine. Couloir – a gulley or narrow passage, often used to describe the Bottleneck on K2. Crampons – sharp spikes affixed to climbing boots to aid traction on ice and snow.

* Denotes high-altitude worker or mountain guide

Death Zone – the name given to altitudes in the troposphere above approximately 8,000 metres in which human existence is unsustainable for long periods because of a reduced capacity to process oxygen. Expedition/siege style – refers to a style of mountaineering which involves the setting up of fixed lines and stocked camps, usually with the assistance of high-altitude workers, in advance of a summit attempt.

Singapore K2 Expedition (Abruzzi route) Robert Goh (leader) Edwin Siew Cheok Wai Ang Chirring Sherpa* Jamling Bhote*

Italian K2 Expedition (Abruzzi route) Marco Confortola (leader) Roberto Manni Mohammad Ali* Mohammad Amin*

Independent climbers Hoselito Bite (Serbia) (Cesen route) Alberto Zerain (Spain) (Abruzzi route)

French TGW K2 Expedition Yannick Graziani Christian Trommsdorff Patrick Wagnon

Sunny Mountain Chogori Expedition George Dijmarescu (leader) Teodora Vid Mircea Leustean Rinjing Sherpa Mingma Tunduk Sherpa

* Denotes high-altitude worker or mountain guide

Fixed ropes – ropes fixed to anchor points along dangerous surfaces or terrain and placed in advance of, or during, an ascent to provide safety for climbers. Jumar – a device used to climb on fixed ropes which slides upwards and locks when any downward pressure is applied. High Camp – Camp Four on the Shoulder on K2. High-altitude workers – people who are employed to work at high altitude, sometimes referred to as high-altitude porters (HAPs). Hypoxia – a condition in which the body or parts of the body are deprived of an adequate supply of oxygen and which often occurs at high altitude. Ice axe – a tool used for climbing on icy surfaces, which can also be used as an anchor or a walking aid. Ice screw – a threaded tubular device used to hold ropes in place during climbing and which can be used as an anchor point for fixed ropes. Lama – a Tibetan cleric or head of a monastery. Low-altitude porters – people who are employed to work at low altitude, sometimes referred to as LAPs. Moraine – rock and ice debris on a glacier. Névé – granular snow. Objective danger – a naturally-occurring phenomenon, such as an avalanche, rockfall or icefall, which usually occurs without warning. Piton – a metal spike used as an anchor. Pulmonary oedema – a condition in which fluid accumulates in the lungs and which may be caused by high altitude. Puja – a ceremony involving worship of a deity through song, prayer and invocation. Rappel – controlled descent using a rope on steep terrain (also known as abseiling). Serac – a large overhanging block or column of ice. Sherpa – a member of, or referring to, an ethnic group in Nepal. The term Sherpa is also used generically for people from the Himalaya who work as mountain guides and high-altitude workers. Sirdar – the head guide on an expedition. 16

PREFACE The overwhelming yearning for adventure and exploration has forever been part of the human condition. The need to discover, to experience and to investigate the furthest reaches of the planet and its most desolate and inhospitable places has an innate and lasting allure that endures even when it seems there is nowhere or nothing left to discover. The longing remains because the human desire to pit oneself against nature and the impulse to push oneself physically, mentally and psychologically to one’s absolute limits, continue to be incredibly potent and powerful forces. Adventurers are always thinking of their next expedition, dreaming of the mountain, the snow and ice, the beauty and the challenge; some deep impulse keeps pulling us back to the outer limits of the natural world. When that impulse is satisfied and the next challenge has been met, thoughts of returning to the comforts of home are relished, only for the cycle to – inevitably – begin all over again, until time or death dictates otherwise. Mountains are like cathedrals, places where, despite, or perhaps because of, the extreme physical demands, space emerges for climbers to be fully present in their own lives in the midst of the world’s most pristine and most dangerous places. Extreme adventurers push the boundaries of calculable risk – often selfishly – to satisfy their aspirations and egos. Family members live with the worry that their loved one may never return; that, despite the most rigorous preparations, they are engaged in a game of Russian roulette. Yet, those at home feel compelled to support their loved ones in the pursuit of their passion and dreams. High-altitude climbing has a distinctive appeal all of its own, one that keeps luring climbers back to the mountains despite all the obstacles, whether physical, emotional or financial. Reaching the summit of the highest peaks means that, for one moment in time, you are standing on a piece of hallowed ground that has been 250 million years in the making, a place that still has an elite membership, despite technical and scientific innovation. 17

What makes higher altitudes all the more demanding and lethal is that lifedenying place above an altitude of 8,000 metres known as the Death Zone, where the body deteriorates rapidly, where brain cells become numb and logical thinking is compromised. In that rarefied atmosphere, strong men are weakened, some become manic, and even the most experienced climbers can crumple under the pressure. In August 2008, on a seemingly perfect day, 11 climbers perished in the Death Zone on K2, the world’s second highest mountain, and also its deadliest. Among the dead was the first Irishman to reach K2’s summit, Gerard (Ger) McDonnell. Ger was on a number of my expeditions to the great mountain ranges of the world and I greatly admired his tenacity, warm personality and wonderful passion for climbing. With Ger on K2 in 2008 was my good friend Pemba Gyalje Sherpa, who had been the sirdar on a number of my Nepalese expeditions, and who spent almost three days in or near K2’s Death Zone, co-ordinating rescue missions and bringing climbers to safety. On Mount Everest in 2003, just 50 metres from the summit, in the Death Zone, both men came to my rescue when I became crippled by oxygen deprivation, oedema and loss of peripheral vision. Also among the victims on K2 in 2008 was my fellow polar explorer, the Norwegian Rolf Bae, a diligent adventurer who, along with Ger, had joined me on the 2006 Beyond Endurance expedition to Antarctica in honour of Ernest Shackleton. The loss of life on K2 had a dramatic aftermath as the tragedy quickly became a controversy. Those who managed to return safely to Base Camp walked away from the devastation on the mountain directly into the turbulence of a media storm, fuelled by a litany of contradictions and inconsistencies, many of which were contained in the survivors’ own accounts. The consequent fallout caused immeasurable pain to many of the families left behind. My search for the truth led me on a five-year journey that has resulted in the publication of this book, along with a joint venture production of the featurelength documentary, The Summit, with director Nick Ryan and Image Now Films. Sources for both the documentary and the book include most of the climbers who were on K2 in 2008, some of their off-mountain team members and family members. Pemba Gyalje Sherpa collaborated fully in the chronicling of his version of events on K2 during the 2008 expedition, and his clear and forthright testimony provides the context for this telling of events. In many ways, this is Pemba’s story. There have been many accounts of what took place on K2 in the early days of August 2008, but such a tragedy, in such circumstances, deserves re-examination in an effort to get a clearer picture of how even the best-prepared climbers were

challenged to the limits of their endurance on the world’s second highest peak. This is a story whose complexity and dramatic nature demanded a chronological telling so that the full tapestry of events could be displayed, drawing out the personalities and themes that make for a more thorough explanation of what drew so many different people to such a desolate, forbidding place, and how and why 11 of them failed to come home. Setting these tragic events in a chronological context, informed by the eyewitness accounts of many of those who were there, and also with the first full testimony of Pemba Gyalje Sherpa will, hopefully, facilitate a new comprehension of how and why things happened as they did, and help readers develop a deeper understanding of what drives people to risk their lives in some of the most hostile and godforsaken places on Earth. This account also details the efforts of five other Sherpas from Nepal who remained in or near the Death Zone over the course of almost three days in their heroic attempts to save fellow climbers. Few reports or investigations are ever conducted when climbers die on the mountains; instead, over time, a narrative emerges from various sources – shared stories, media articles, interviews, documentaries and books. It is hoped that this book will contribute to a greater comprehension of what happened. What we can learn and begin to talk about is what can be done differently in the future – the need for enhanced training and preparation for high-altitude adventure, the ability to know one’s own limits and capacities and, above all, the need to respect nature and the mountains. The story of what happened on K2 during the 2008 climbing season will captivate many and shock even more, prompting questions about why men and women continue to be drawn to places where the dance between humans and nature, between life and death, is at its most passionate and fragile.

Pat Falvey

FOREWORD I grew up surrounded by the Himalaya mountains on a farm near the village of Pankhongma in the Solukhumbu District in Nepal, 50 kilometres south of Everest, the worldâ€™s highest peak. Several generations of my family earned a living from the land and from a young age I worked on the farm with my father. My village was on one of the main trekking routes to Everest and climbers often stopped off there on the way, regularly camping in the grounds of my school. I was just a teenager when I first met Sir Edmund Hillary, who, along with Tenzing Norgay Sherpa, summited Everest for the first time in 1953. Hillary, the most renowned mountaineer of his generation, visited my school many times as his charitable foundation was supporting a number of educational projects in the region, including providing funding to our school. Hillary returned on several occasions over the years to assess progress. He also spoke freely with me and my fellow students about mountaineering and his experience on Everest. I was captivated and greatly inspired by his stories. At 14 years of age, I began my own career on the mountains, working first as a porter ferrying the gear and supplies of expeditions to the mountains around my home, and earning some money to support my family. I learned much from the older Sherpa climbers in my region, observing closely their methods and skills. After years of learning, training and researching, I became a full-time guide and mountaineer, eventually becoming one of the first Sherpas in Nepal to gain international professional accreditation. Gradually, I enhanced my high-altitude experience by completing multiple climbs above an altitude of 6,000 metres and higher in the Himalaya. I have always believed that, for every expedition, thorough preparation is vital. So I have always encouraged high-altitude adventurers to gain sufficient experience at 6,000 metres and 7,000 metres, before progressing to the very highest peaks in the world. By 2008, I had summited Everest seven times in seven successive seasons and had been on 40 expeditions into the Death Zone, on both Everest and Cho Oyu. 20

Experience has taught me that all climbers come to the highest peaks in the world because of their love for the mountains and nature. But climbers have varying degrees of technical ability, skill and training. Those variations in capacity and experience are often the difference between life and death. I have often seen climbers coming to the mountains ill-equipped and illprepared. But I have also seen how even the most able and experienced of climbers can collapse under the strain of conditions above 8,000 metres. K2 has a deep resonance for climbers; it is magnetic. I always considered it a very technically challenging mountain, best suited to professionals only, and in my many years working on Everest and other mountains, I never considered climbing K2 as a guide. In 2008, I was invited to be a full and equal member of a Dutch-led expedition to the mountain. I decided to go because it was a chance to visit the Karakorum mountains and also because my Irish friend, Ger McDonnell, was on the team. In The Summit: How Triumph turned to Tragedy on K2â€™s Deadliest Days, I provide, for the first time, a full account of what I experienced during the almost three months I spent at K2 in 2008. I describe events from the time we arrived at Base Camp, through the days and weeks of acclimatisation and preparation, the summit attempt itself and subsequent efforts to rescue those who became stranded in the Death Zone. In particular, I recount the devastating series of events that occurred between 1 and 3 August which saw 11 climbers lose their lives. What I offer here is my story, alongside the first-hand accounts of others who were also on the mountain, which, I hope, will bring a greater clarity to what happened during those dreadful days.

Pemba Gyalje Sherpa

RUSSIA

KAZAKHSTAN

SHIMSHAL TERRITORY

UZBEKISTAN

TURKMENISTAN

KABUL

Skardu

PAKISTAN

INDIA

Islamabad

ISLAMABAD

Askole

BROAD PEAK

CHINA

TAJIKISTAN KA

IRAN

Gilgit

KYRGYZSTAN

CHINA

TIBET

AFGHANISTAN

HIM

PAKISTAN

The route from Islamabad to K2

EVEREST

NEPAL CHINA

INDIA UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

OMAN

SAUDI ARABIA PAKISTAN

8,611m

YEMEN

Base Camp

GODWIN-AUSTEN Glacier

Baltoro Glacier TO ASKOLE

URDUKAS LILIWA

BIANGE

CONCORDIA

K2 and its location in Asia

The route across the Baltoro glacier

RUSSIA

KAZAKHSTAN

SHIMSHAL TERRITORY

UZBEKISTAN

TURKMENISTAN

KABUL

Skardu

PAKISTAN

INDIA

Islamabad

ISLAMABAD

Askole

BROAD PEAK

CHINA

TAJIKISTAN KA

IRAN

Gilgit

KYRGYZSTAN

CHINA

TIBET

AFGHANISTAN

HIM

PAKISTAN

The route from Islamabad to K2

EVEREST

NEPAL CHINA

INDIA UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

OMAN

SAUDI ARABIA PAKISTAN

8,611m

YEMEN

Base Camp

GODWIN-AUSTEN Glacier

Baltoro Glacier TO ASKOLE

URDUKAS LILIWA

BIANGE

CONCORDIA

K2 and its location in Asia

The route across the Baltoro glacier

Prologue

The Summit

Prologue

May 2008

the mountains and partly to earn some hard cash. The work is quite profitable by local economic standards. The sirdar negotiates remuneration for the porters, a daily rate of around $10, payable on arrival at Base Camp. When all the hiring is done, rates agreed and cargo arranged, the porters wait in line, ready to tether to their backs and the tops of their heads boxes and containers full of high-tech clothing, satellite technology and new-fangled mountaineering gadgets, and carry them across the glaciers thousands of metres above.

The hardy, weather-beaten farmers from the foothills of the Karakorum mountains make their way to the small village of Askole in one of the most remote and inaccessible parts of northern Pakistan. Some walk for hours along crumbling roads and dirt tracks which wind their way through the parched and barren terrain deep in Asia’s most mountainous region. The men, mostly middle-aged but some not much older than teenagers, descend from their farms and homesteads around Askole in search of work. The climbing season is about to get under way and the dusty and featureless singlestorey outpost is preparing to host a diverse assortment of international climbers in search of adventure on the ever-alluring mountains in the region. Despite its remoteness, this part of northern Pakistan, situated along the border with China, has attracted explorers and thrill-seekers to the challenges of high-altitude adventure for over 100 years. Askole comes to life with the injection of people and revenue which the annual climbing season brings; the village is the climbers’ final encounter with civilisation before several weeks, or maybe months, on the mountains beyond. To launch their summit bids, the expeditions require hundreds of porters to ferry heavy loads of hiking gear, tents, clothing, foodstuffs and communications equipment to camps in the glacial valleys above, places far beyond the access of any motorised vehicle. For that service, the expedition members pay well, often enough to match several months of the regular earnings of their newly-hired staff. The expeditions’ sirdars, the head guides responsible for mobilising and organising the porters, put the word about if any particularly large expeditions are due to arrive, news of additional short-term employment prospects rippling around the region. As well as older men looking to supplement the meagre incomes they derive from farming in Askole’s hinterland, younger porters, even a few college students, assemble, partly out of excitement at the prospect of a few weeks on

The porters’ routine has been a mainstay of the climbing season in the GilgitBaltistan district of Pakistan ever since outsiders first came to explore and survey the region, fascinated by the vast expanse of soaring mountains and gigantic glaciers which run from the Karakorum on the China-Pakistan border southeastwards to the Himalaya which separate China from India. The peaks form a vast phalanx of mountains, born millennia earlier when the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates ploughed into each other, forcing volcanic ash and rock skyward, and forming a jagged, inhospitable and remote landscape of peaks and valleys. Historically part of the Silk Road trading route between Europe and Asia, the advent of colonialism and the expansion of the British Empire brought an increased commercial and geographical interest in the region from the West. It wasn’t until 1856 and the arrival of a British army lieutenant-colonel, Thomas Montgomerie, that the full breadth and dimensions of the mountain ranges in the region came to be known. As part of the Great Trigonometric Survey of India, Montgomerie took up a position on the summit of Haramukh in northern India, 200 kilometres to the south of the Karakorum range. From there, and with the aid of an angle-measuring theodolite, he charted and calculated the heights of the array of peaks along the horizon. Thirty-two summits were visible, two of which jutted way above their peers. He sketched what he saw in his notebook. A simple nomenclature had to be found; Montgomerie decided he would call each of the peaks ‘K’ – shorthand for Karakorum – and then append a number to every one of the 32. And so was born the name of the world’s second highest mountain, K2. K1 soon came to be known by its local name, Masherbrum, but the name given to the higher peak stuck.

The Summit

Prologue

May 2008

The Summit

Prologue

For a brief period in the mid- to late-nineteenth century, the name Mount Godwin-Austen was used to refer to K2; the English topographer, Henry Haversham Godwin-Austen, is credited with being the first westerner, in 1861, to see the mountain close up from the top of the glacier which weaves its way towards K2’s flanks on the Pakistani side. Godwin-Austen, instead, lent his name to the glacier on which he stood. The Godwin-Austen glacier forms a corridor towards the peak from the south where it intersects with the massive Baltoro glacier, which, in turn, runs over 65 kilometres southwest towards Askole and civilisation. Chogori, a name used locally for the soaring peak, and deriving from the Balti words chhogo (big) and ri (mountain), never caught on. Montgomerie’s original classification endured, and of his 32 ‘Ks’ only ‘K2’ is still commonly used.

As night falls, a sense of anticipation builds; tomorrow the climbers will begin the trek towards Base Camp where the expedition will begin in earnest, years of preparation and logistical planning finally realised. Ambition battles with fear, excitement with trepidation as a proper night’s sleep proves elusive. The first group of porters will be gone by dawn to prepare camps and meals before the visitors even emerge from their tents.

Climbers spend their last night in pre-mountain society in their tents in Askole, having made the long journey from the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, where permits are secured and other paperwork is completed before the 750-kilometre journey along the Karakorum Highway to the busy northern city of Skardu. The highway is the highest paved road in the world and is notoriously dangerous, often blocked by monsoon downpours and heavy snowfall. From Skardu, a heavily potholed and poorly maintained mountain road brings the expeditions to Askole. Some of the expeditions have high-altitude workers travelling with them; men who will work as guides and helpers until the climbers leave the mountain. They assist in fixing ropes, carrying oxygen and other supplies, and leading their clients towards the summit. A handful are Sherpas from Nepal, thousands of kilometres away in the Himalaya, but most are from northern Pakistan and are generally hired based on their experience of the Karakorum mountains and their understanding and knowledge of high-altitude climbing. Before the porters receive their allocation, the climbers check and re-check the inventory of their supplies, all bearing detailed labels to ensure foodstuffs rationed for the following two-month period are not dipped into any sooner than they should be. A precise catalogue of everything – from socks to spices, gas stoves to crampons, satellite phones to anti-inflammatory drugs – will have been calculated and formulated months before, based on a detailed daily allowance of items for the journey ahead.

As the climbers begin the ascent towards the icy moraine of the Baltoro glacier, they follow in the footsteps of the countless expeditions that have encroached upon the pristine landscape for over a century, each with varying degrees of success. One of the earliest expeditions was led by Aleister Crowley, the controversial English mystic, occultist, self-styled prophet and founder of the religious philosophy of Thelema. With his friend, Oscar Eckenstein, Crowley made five failed summit bids in the space of nine weeks in the summer of 1902.1 On the higher slopes, the expedition descended into near farce; at one point, a hypoxic and delirious Crowley – ‘one of the strangest men ever to become a mountaineer’2 – threatened a team-mate with a gun. Seven years later, it fell to an equally flamboyant man, the Duke of the Abruzzi – grandson of Italy’s first king – to attempt K2’s summit. Fresh from expeditions to the Arctic and several mountains across the world, the renowned explorer arrived via the Baltoro glacier with a brass bed, camel hair-lined sleeping bags and other trappings of royalty. Despite being well resourced and having the best mountaineering equipment available, the duke and his team ascended no higher than 6,100 metres. His hopes of a new high-altitude record were dashed but he later lent his name to the southeast ridge via which he attempted the summit, a name still in use today. The duke’s expedition also gave the world some of the most iconic images ever taken of the mountain, which were captured by Vittorio Sella, the noted high-altitude photographer. The elusive and mysterious K2 quickly captured the imagination of the small international mountaineering fraternity at a time when the conquest of mountains was a badge of glory, not just for climbers, but also for the countries from which they came. An American-led expedition in 1939 saw its leader, the well-known socialite, Dudley Wolfe, perish after several days stranded at the higher camps.

The Summit

Prologue

The Summit

Prologue

Three Sherpas died in an attempt to rescue him, the first recorded fatalities on K2. After a decline in the number of expeditions to the mountain during the second World War and in its immediate aftermath, summit success finally came to a meticulously prepared Italian expedition in 1954. Just a year after Everest had been scaled by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay Sherpa, the 40-yearold Italian, Lino Lacadelli, and his fellow countryman, 29-year-old Achille Compagnoni, stood together at 8,611 metres on the snow-capped apex on the evening of 31 July. Nobody would set foot on the summit for another 23 years.3 The widely-celebrated Italian summit success was tinged with controversy, however, and their achievement was sullied by accusation and counter-accusation of selfishness and lies. Another member of the expedition, Walter Bonatti, had climbed towards Lacadelli and Compagnoni with supplementary oxygen to improve their prospects of success. Bonatti later accused Compagnoni of moving the highest camp, Camp Nine, to a location other than that agreed, forcing him and a Hunza porter, Amir Mahdi, to bivouac in the open air overnight. The summiteers later retrieved the oxygen and Bonatti and Mahdi descended to a lower camp. Bonatti always held that Compagnoni didn’t want him to share in the summiteers’ success. Though Bonatti was considered fitter than Compagnoni, and had a real prospect of summiting, the latter was the favoured protégé of the team leader, Ardito Desio. Bonatti’s claims were largely written out of the official record of events although he eventually cleared his name in the Italian courts. However, there was never any reconciliation between him and the summiteers.4 Half a century later, the Italian Alpine Club publicly acknowledged Bonatti as integral to the 1954 summit success. The mountain continued to appeal to the more courageous and adventurous. In 1979, the South Tyrolean Italian climber, Reinhold Messner, climbed K2 along a route on the south face which he dubbed ‘The Magic Line’. This success contributed to his record achievement of becoming the first person in the world to have climbed every one of the world’s 14 peaks above 8,000 metres, known as the 8,000ers in the mountaineering fraternity. It was 1986 before a woman set foot on the summit. Wanda Rutkiewicz, from Poland, saw her achievement overshadowed, however, by the deaths of two of her climbing partners, the French husband and wife, Maurice and Liliane Barrard, who died in a suspected icefall below the summit. That same climbing season became known as K2’s ‘Black Summer’ when a total of 13 climbers perished in different accidents between June and August. As the number of expeditions

arriving to K2 rose in the 1980s and 1990s, so, too, did the number of fatalities on what was rapidly becoming known as the ‘Killer Mountain’.5

Unlike Everest and many other iconic peaks in the Himalaya and the Karakorum, K2 is relatively inaccessible, one of the many reasons it is climbed less often and has never gained the popularity and allure of its peers. Ahead of all climbers leaving Askole is a four- to seven-day trek to the foot of the mountain. Transporting tons of equipment across the Baltoro glacier, the mammoth ice field that leads almost all the way to the base of the mountain, is laborious, physically demanding and expensive. The party of climbers and porters – up to 20 porters are required for every climber – move from an altitude of 2,500 metres to 5,000 metres over the course of the trek, traversing ice fields, gushing streams and rubble-strewn terrain. The neighbouring ice tributaries feed into the Baltoro – one of the longest glaciers outside the polar regions and two kilometres wide in places – giving an aerial view resembling the fronds of seaweed splayed out across the valley. As the human caravan weaves its way up the glacial valley, the multitude of peaks which make up the Karakorum range comes into view, reminding the adventurers that each step is taking them closer to the mountain they have been thinking and dreaming about for years. The Karakorum region is home to some of the most celebrated mountains in the world, each peak offering a different experience, its own tests and dangers and a distinctive and unique adrenalin rush. Gasherbrum I, II, III and IV, Masherbrum (K1) and Broad Peak (K3), along with an adventure park of climbing walls and cliffs of black granite, including the landmark Trango Towers, present a veritable smörgåsbord of some of the most exhilarating and bestknown climbing challenges in the world. But just one of the star attractions occupies the concentration of the chain snaking its way across the footbridges, boulders and snow: appropriately, K2 – dwarfing its neighbours – is the final destination on the route, the majestic terminus at the end of the rugged glacier. The climbers come from different cultures and ethnic backgrounds, from different socio-economic groups and professions; they speak different languages and have different belief systems and approaches. They also have varying levels of experience and proficiency. Each will have left behind a family – parents, 31

The Summit

Prologue

arriving to K2 rose in the 1980s and 1990s, so, too, did the number of fatalities on what was rapidly becoming known as the ‘Killer Mountain’.5

Prologue

The Summit

partners, perhaps a husband or wife, or young children – in their quest to explore not just some of the world’s most majestic and dangerous places, but also to explore the limits of their physical and psychological capacities. But the disparate group shares one thing in common – a passion for adventure, allied to a desire to achieve something few people on the planet ever will – overcoming the challenge of some of the most hostile but beautiful natural features in the world: its highest mountains. For some, getting to Base Camp, or maybe one of the higher camps on the mountain, will be their ‘summit’; for others, nothing less than the summit itself will suffice. But, for all, their love of climbing, being on the mountains and embracing the risks that presents, is the common bond they share, the stresses and strains of home, work and family fading with each step that takes them higher into the icy wilderness. Despite the withdrawal of daily comforts and luxuries, the climbers begin to feel utterly alive, every sense more receptive and responsive to their surroundings. Whatever happens on this adventure, a new personal story is being written, one with which they will regale family and friends for years to come. Hope and fear battle for supremacy inside them as they prepare to test the limits of their abilities and defy their own mortality.

Before the 8,611-metre K2 is unveiled in all its glory, the climbers must continue their trek alongside the ghosts of Crowley, the Duke of the Abruzzi and Lacadelli. Up to eight hours of hiking each day takes its toll but they know that every kilometre brings them closer to the fitness levels which are required to mount a serious summit bid. The low-altitude porters (LAPs) run with their cargo across parts of the more dangerous terrain, dodging and ducking beneath rock faces which are prone to shunting stones and boulders towards the ground at speed. By night, they rest in bivouac-style shelters while the climbers sleep in their expensive, high-quality tents. For the entire footslog across the Baltoro, the climbers’ target remains out of sight, hidden behind the gigantic peaks that stand sentry around it. It is not until they reach Concordia, the confluence of the Baltoro glacier and the much shorter Godwin-Austen glacier, that the expedition members get a first full glimpse of the imposing peak which has been in their thoughts and minds for years on end.

Though the mountain is still up to a day’s walk away, this is a moment to pause in awe, to holler in relief at having come this far, to reach for a camera in a rucksack, to grapple with the extent of the mammoth task ahead. Reinhold Messner dubbed K2 ‘the most beautiful of all the high peaks’.6 Most of his contemporaries would agree. Despite the close proximity of its peers, the almostperfectly symmetrical diamond-shaped pinnacle stands out from the crowd, a pyramidal rock reaching upwards towards the heavens and resting imperially on the glacial plains below. The first sighting of K2 also forces the climbers to confront another reality – its deadly reputation and status as the world’s most dangerous peak. Names like ‘Killer Mountain’ and ‘Savage Mountain’, which locals sometimes dismiss as unjustified and unfair, have a certain ring of truth, at least when the statistics are examined. Before the climbing season of 2008, just 278 people had successfully scaled K2, 66 of whom had died in the attempt – a fatality rate of 24 per cent. Out of every four climbers attempting the mountain, one will not come home. Thus, the mantra of ‘one in four’ has become a familiar refrain for those warning of the dangers of the world’s second highest peak. In stark comparison, one in 11 of those trying to scale Everest had lost their lives by 2008.7 The fatality rate on Annapurna (8,091 metres) in Nepal – at one in three – was higher in the same period, but it has fallen steadily in recent years while K2’s has remained stubbornly high. In many climbing seasons K2 can go unclimbed; even in a busy season it is often just a handful of climbers who make it to the top. In 2006, while hundreds successfully scaled Everest, just four people summited K2. Less commercialised than Everest and despite its seniority in the pecking order of mountains, K2 has never lured climbers like its taller sister; its unpopularity, relative to its only superior, is reflected in the cost of the permit required to travel there. A Pakistani ministry of tourism permit for K2 in 2008 cost $10,000 per climber while one for Everest cost about $80,000, though the low fee for K2 was in part an attempt by the Pakistani government to attract adventurers in the wake of a number of terrorist incidents in the region. Acute natural hazards and objective dangers, such as frequent ice avalanches and rockfall, make survival on K2 extremely precarious. Unstable and turbulent weather patterns are yet another deterrent. Impacted heavily by the jet stream airflow thousands of metres above sea level, the mountain has developed a reputation for climatic unpredictability rarely matched in the region. Weather forecasts, so detailed and comprehensive in modern meteorology, have to be taken with a liberal pinch of salt.

Prologue

The Summit

A moment of calm on K2’s slopes can transform into a blizzard in minutes, a phenomenon that has put paid – sometimes with fatal consequences – to many attempts on its summit. K2 is over 1,000 kilometres further north than Everest, and consequently prone to lower temperatures and heavier snows. The dozens of potential routes to the summit, a handful of which are now the most favoured, pose all those hazards and are only for those who are more competent and technically dexterous. But the summit is also only attainable by those who can overcome the crushing effects of high altitude which can render climbers incapable of even the most basic brain and bodily functions. In the Death Zone – the region above 8,000 metres – the bodily organs begin to fail, unable to metabolise or process oxygen as efficiently as required to sustain life. Whatever its fatality rate, its natural hazards and its unpredictability, for many in the climbing fraternity, K2 is a thing of beauty which captivates them and which they consider the most significant prize in modern-day mountaineering. It is there to be climbed and, for many, a lifelong ambition remains unfulfilled until that challenge is undertaken. In the 10 years to 2008, the summit had been reached in just five of them, but this proved no deterrent. In the summer of that year, its allure and appeal was no different to that experienced by the Duke of the Abruzzi and the countless others who had come before, some having tasted summit success, others having never returned. A Nepalese climber named Pemba Gyalje was the first person to set foot at K2’s base in 2008. He will never forget the first time he laid eyes on the mountain: I was face to face with K2. I felt it was a very steep mountain. It was a single mountain standing out, not like Everest which is surrounded by several other peaks. It did not remind me of anything else – this was just K2. I thought it was very beautiful.

The Summit

Chapter

one

The Waiting Game

Chapter

one

The Waiting Game

The Summit

The Waiting Game I 28 May – 20 July

28 May – 20 July As Pemba Gyalje slid the rucksack off his back and onto the rocky ground, he breathed in the crisp air. Since two Kazakhstani climbers had reached K2’s summit the previous autumn, the remote mountain region had lain pristine and untouched. Pemba, a Nepalese climbing Sherpa, was the first person to set foot on the pedestal of the world’s second highest mountain that year. Behind him, applause echoed around the vast expanse. The expedition leader, Wilco van Rooijen, had just told the 100 porters who had hauled the tons of equipment and supplies across the Baltoro glacier to Base Camp that, instead of being paid for seven days’ work, they would be paid for 10. The porters were overjoyed; they had earned enough money to sustain their families and livelihoods for months. Bedecked in their much-prized special expedition peaked caps, which Wilco had printed up for them as a souvenir, the porters dropped the dozens of barrels and boxes of climbing gear and supplies on the glacial moraine and hurried away, back towards civilisation. It was 28 May 2008 and Pemba was one of a team of eight supremelyequipped and rigorously-prepared climbers who were the first mountaineering expedition that summer to take up residence on the undulating plateau at the top of the Godwin-Austen glacier beneath the towering K2 – a place which would become their home for the next two and a half months. After weeks of arduous travel by airplane, bus, jeep and on foot, the Dutch K2 International Expedition had finally arrived to the spot where they pitched their tents and temporary auxiliary dwellings on the rock and ice for the weeks that lay ahead. The eight climbers, including five Dutchmen, an Australian, a Nepali and an Irishman, comprised the members of the expedition which had been in the planning phase for almost two years. After a seven-day trek from the now-distant Askole, they reached a place nearly four kilometres beneath the summit where they set up Base Camp, home each summer to a menagerie of mountaineers from across the globe, compelled to come there by a shared passion and common goal. 38

It was a place without any precise geographical boundaries, no known address and no specific location on any map but it was the approximate point at which climbers seeking to conquer K2 could set up camp safely, out of the path of the rockfall, avalanches and turbulent weather episodes for which the mountain had gained a reputation. Pemba and his climbing partners stood at an altitude of just over 5,000 metres above sea level, on a par with Turkey’s Mount Ararat and Amarnath Peak in the Himalaya. The landscape was peppered with manifold boulders and debris, pushed down and aside by the massive glacier as it moved gradually across the valley. It was an inhospitable place, with scant vegetation and animal life, the terrain and environment anathema to the bare essentials and comforts of daily living. On every side of the barren plain, mountains soared towards the skies, none more daunting or impressive in Pemba’s eyes than the highest peak in the Karakorum mountain range. The silence at K2’s Base Camp was almost deafening, in stark contrast to the ever-bustling Everest Base Camp from where Pemba had launched each of his seven successful summit attempts, one year after another. Often home to up to 1,000 people each climbing season, the encampment below the world’s highest mountain was akin to a small town with people scattered across the plateau; at K2, there was no-one, something which spoke volumes in Pemba’s mind about the mountain’s reputation: When you see 1,000 people at Everest Base Camp from different countries – huge manpower and good service – you are thinking I want to climb Everest next year. K2 is different – at Base Camp there are minimal people, limited facilities, services, minimal manpower. There are only people who really want to do it.

Pemba paused for breath and surveyed the ground around him. There had been a recent heavy snowfall, its brilliant whiteness reflecting the rays of the afternoon sun. The expedition had the advantage of being the first to reach Base Camp; now they had plenty of potential sites to choose from, but finding a place to establish their temporary homes on what was an active, imperceptibly moving glacier was no easy task. A minute shift in the moraine in the dead of night could be enough to collapse a tent, knock over barrels of foodstuffs or damage essential gear. Tents would have to be regularly adjusted and sometimes moved to accommodate the creeping, icy juggernaut beneath. Pemba brought his experience of establishing many Base Camps at Everest to bear on his first K2 expedition: 39

The Summit

The Waiting Game I 28 May – 20 July