Everest by climbers.eu

Scott E Fischer (December 24, 1955 – May 11, 1996) was an American climber and guide, and the first American to summit 27,940-foot (8,516 meter) Lhotse, fourth highest mountain in the world. Fischer spent his early life in Michigan and New Jersey and took two years of climbing courses after being inspired at the age of 14 by a show he saw on television. In 1982, he and his wife, Jeannie Price, moved west to Seattle, Washington where they raised two children, Andy and Katie Rose. In the 1984, Fischer formed his own adventure company, Mountain Madness, which he set up to guarantee clients the summit of the world’s highest mountains for fees in the $50,000 range. In 1992, while climbing K2 successfully, he was involved in a daring rescue of Chantal Mauduit, a French woman climber who became severely snow blind. She went on to climb five more eight-thousanders but died in an avalanche on Dhaulagiri (1998). From the 1992 season, Fischer brought a new level of commercialism to adventures from successes of climbing.

He died in the 1996 Everest Disaster on May 11, the worst tragedy in the climbing history of Mount Everest. On May 10, 1996, Fischer, Anatoli Boukreev and Neal Beidleman guided eight of their clients to the summit of Everest. On the descent, the team was caught in a severe snowstorm. All the climbers managed to reach Camp IV on the South Col (7,900 m or 25,900 feet), except Fischer.

Fischer, who had reached the summit at around 3:45pm, had severe difficulties on the descent. Fischer was accompanied by sirdar (chief Sherpa) Lopsang Jangbu, but just below the south summit, Fischer was unable to continue and finally coaxed Lopsang to descend without him. Lopsang did so, with the hopes that he would be able to send someone else back up with additional supplemental oxygen and help Fischer get down. Boukreev, after prematurely descending ahead of his clients earlier in the day, made several attempts to reach Fischer, but turned back on the first two attempts due to the weather, though he succeeded in rescuing several other stranded people.

Finally, around 7pm on May 11, Boukreev was able to reach Fischer’s position, but unfortunately it was too late. Many speculate that Fischer had been suffering from a severe form of altitude sickness, either HACE or HAPE. A memorial cairn for Scott Fischer can be found at the top of a hill near Lobuche, on the trail to Everest base camp.

Accounts of what happened in 1996 were described in the books The Climb by Anatoli Boukreev and Gary Weston DeWalt, Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, and Left for Dead by Beck Weathers.

I would like to invite you to watch new movie :” 10 day trek in the Solo Khumbu Region of Nepal.. ” ….. more :

Treking in Solo Khumbu region /version polish and english/

The golden decade of Polish Himalayan mountaineering, besides the unquestionable personal accomplishments of Jurek Kukuczka, Wanda Rutkiewicz, Wojtek Kurtyka and others, also saw winter achievements that were a team rather than individual success. It was particularly noticeable during the winter expeditions how the whole team worked for the result. In Winter it is difficult to achieve success without teamwork. Climbing in the Alps or the Tatras in wintertime is no longer surprising to anyone: it was the natural course of things, an attempt to raise the challenge without raising the altitude. The same had to occur in high mountains too.And it’s great that it was achieved by Poles. Jurek Werteresiewicz drew up a programme, Andrzej Zawada implemented it and many of us put it into practice, often successfully but there were failures as well.In recent years a total withdrawal from wintertime climbing could be observed in the Tatras, the Alps as well as the Himalayas. The late Andrzej Zawada would remark: “Tell me what you’ve done and I’ll tell you who you are (that is to say, what you’re worth). Winter experiences were valuable, however. Meanwhile the standards have been lowered by the rat-race to easy and quick successes (which actually has been the case in every field).No-one dreams of climbing the great walls of the Himalayas, of new routes, traverses… The attitude is to climb Mt. Everest if you have cash and if not, another easy 8000-metre mountain, as long as it’s fast and easy. When, after many years, I met Elisabeth Hawley in Katmandu in January this year, we began reminiscing the 1970s and 1980s, when the Japanese, Poles, Englishmen, Frenchmen, Russians and the Slovenians would come with sports programmes, in order to compete with the others, to reach places that had not been reached so far, to go down in the history of conquests of the highest mountains. There is the same number of expeditions as before but they lack ambitions goals. The ambitious ones can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Generally, there is a fad for easy and pleasant climbing, preferably at weekends because it does not require sacrificing your time or career. It has to be fun. It has to be cool.As for our Polish scene, the Sports Committees, if they exist at all, lack creativity. Committees and boards tend to accept programmes aimed at a quick, usually personal success of the Himalayan climbers that God still keeps alive. I realize that we live in times when each success has to be associated with a name, with individuals who easily lend themselves to the requirements of the media. But why is it a problem to proclaim: “Poles have climbed Sisha Pangma or K-2 in winter”?According to the old rule, you should do what you do best. We were successful in high mountain winter explorations. After all, half of fourteen 8000-metre peaks were climbed by Poles, within just eight years (1980-1988) to boot. Six unconquered peaks are waiting for us, but volunteers are nowhere to be seen.Let the nickname “Ice Warriors”, given us by Englishmen, be inscribed in the history of Himalayan climbing for ever.We missed out on the great exploration of the Himalayas irreversibly, and it is more and more difficult to find new (logical) routes. We could still improve our style, and we could revive the best moments of wintertime experiences. I know that for some people wintertime climbing is “the art of suffering” but I also know that for others it is a male adventure, with teamwork, the rule “one for all and all for one”, brotherhood and common goals. Those who have experienced that do not need to be convinced, whereas the majority of adversaries of wintertime Himalayan climbing can be found among those who simply have not tried it or are unable to work in a team, are afraid to lose their “libero” position, afraid of a violation of their individuality. We are going separate ways! We have done one half of the job. Now it’s your turn to finish it: you the young, angry and ambitious. We are giving you eight years, the same time as we needed. It’s fair enough, isn’t it? If you could pullit off, wouldn’t it be great? Can you imagine that? All 8000-metre peaks conquered for the first time in Winter, all by Poles. There is a chance for success. It is a game worth devoting time, money and efforts. Now is the time to make decisions. This proposal is addressed to the Polish Mountaineering Association: how to create the right environment, how to make “the young” interested in this idea? You may count on my generation, on our help, our experience, even our active participation. The choice is yours! If you do not take up the challenge, we shall have to take it on our old shoulders, without a guarantee of success. K-2, Makalu, Nanga Parbat, Gasherbrum I and Gasherbrum II, Broad Peak are waiting for you (or us).Let’s join Europe, with our head held high and with self-esteem. There is little time left!

*Manifesto on 2002 r – Polski Związk Alpinizmu

2007 Winter Nanga Parbat: It’s over – http://www.mounteverest.net/news.php?id=15523

Pierwsze wejścia :

Złota dekada polskiego himalaizmu prócz niepodważalnych osobistych wyników Jurka Kukuczki, Wandy Rutkiewicz, Wojtka Kurtyki i innych to równieżnasze zimowe dokonania, które były bardziej sukcesem grupowym niż indywidualnym. To na wyprawach zimowych szczególnie było widoczne , jak zespół pracował na wynik. Trudno jest zimą osiągnąć sukces jednostce bez pomocy zespołu. Wspinanie w porze zimowej w Alpach czy Tatrach nikogo już nie dziwi: było naturalną koleją rzeczy , próbą podniesienia poprzeczki bez zwiększania wysokości. To musiało się stać i w wgórach wysokich.Dobrze, że stało się to za sprawą Polaków. Jurek Werteresiewicz nakreślił program, Andrzej Zawada wprowadził go w życie, a wielu z nas go realizowało, często nawet z powodzeniem, chociaż były i porażki.Wostatnich latach można zauważyć całkowity odwrót od wspinania się zimą. Dotyczy to Tatr, Alp, a także Himalajów. Ś.p. Andrzej Zawada zwykł mówić: “Powiedz mi, co zrobiłeś zimą w Tatrach, a powiem ci kim jesteś ( czytaj , ile jesteś wart). Doświadczenia zimowe były jednak w cenie.Tymczasem wraz z owczym pędem do szybkiego sukcesu ( na każdym zresztą polu), obniżono poprzeczkę. Już nie marzy się o przejściu wielkich ścian Himalajów, o nowych drogach, o trawersach.Myśli się, aby wejść na Mt. Everest, jeśli ma się kasę, a jeśli nie , to na jakiś łatwy ośmiotysięcznik, byle szybko, byle łatwo. W styczniu tego roku, gdy po latach spotkałem się z panią Elisabeth Hawley w Katmandu, zaczęliśmy wspominać lata 70.i 80.,kiedy to przyjeżdżali Japończycy, Polacy, Anglicy, Francuzi, Rosjanie, Słoweńcy ze sportowymi programami, by rywalizować z innymi, zdobywać, co jeszcze nie zdobyte, zapisać się w historii podboju gór najwyższych. Wypraw przybywa tyle samo, ale ambitnych celów już nie. Można je policzyć na palcach jednej ręki. W ogóle nadeszła moda na wspinanie łatwe, przyjemne, najlepiej weekendowe, bo nie wymaga poświęcenia czasu lub kariery. Po prostu “for fun” i by było ” cool”.….Rozumiem teraz takie czasy, że każdy sukces musi być kojarzony z nazwiskiem,osobą, że to dobrze podaje się wymogom medialnym, ale co stoi na przeszkodzie, by znów mówiono: Polacy weszli zimą na Sisha Pangma czy na K-2!Stara zasada mówi, że powinno się robić to , co nam dobrze wychodzi. Dobrze zapisaliśmy się w zimowej eksploracji w górach wysokich. W końcu z czternastu szczytów ośmiotysięcznych połowę zdobyli Polacy i to w ciągu zaledwie ośmiu lat (1980 -1988). Jeszcze sześćszczytów czeka na nas, są dziewicze, a chętnych nie widać.Niech przydomek ” Ice Warriors”, nadany nam przez Anglików, na stałe zapisze się w historii himalaizmu. .. My zdobyliśmy połowę. Teraz kolej na Was: młodych, gniewnych , ambitnych. Dajemy Wam też osiem lat, tyle , ile nam było potrzeba. To chyba fair ? To byłaby sprawa, możecie sobie wyobrazić? Wszystkie szczyty ośmiotysięczne zdobyte po raz pierwszy zimą, wszystkie przez Polaków. Jest taka szansa, to jest gra warta poświęcenia czasu, sił, środków. To czas na decyzje. To propozycja pod adresem PZA, jak stworzyć warunki, jak zainteresować “młodych” taką ideą? Ze strony mojego pokolenia możecie otrzymać pomoc, doświadczenie, nawet aktywne uczestnictwo. Wybór należy do Was! Bo jeśli nie, to …my zmuszeni będziemy wziąć to na swoje barki, już stare i nie gwarantujące, że cel osiągniemy. Przed Wami ( lub przed nami) K-2, Makalu, Nanga Parbat, Gasherbrum I i Gasherbrum II , Broad Peak.

*Manifest został odczytany w 2002 roku na zjeździe Polskiego Związku Alpinizmu

Winter Nanga Parbat – zimowa wyprawa Wielickiego z 2007r ; niestety wyprawa nie zakończyła sie sukcesem , himalaistów pokonała pogoda o czym napisze już niebawem….

Nepal is country of mountains and it has plenty of mountain rivers. So rafting is very popular in Nepal rivers. There are many rivers in Nepal for rafting but the Sunkoshi, the Trishuli and the Kaligandaki are major ones. Sunkishi river was rated as the world’s top 10 rafting rivers by Adventure Travel Magazine.

Rafting is highly dependent on season and monsoon is the worst time for rafting as conditions are damp, trails are muddy and rivers are often too high. From October, when the monsoon ends, the conditions are perfect. The weather is superb,the scenery is green. Spring is best season for rafting as the weather is warmer and the melting snow means fast- flowing water.

There are many rafting companies in Kathmandu. They will offer you all needs and you don’t need any preparations if you like to go for rafting. The operator will costs you from $25 -$75+ a day and one trip generally takes 3 to 9 days. Below is introduction to rafting rivers in Nepal.

Trishuli River

Probably it is the most popular river in Nepal.this river starts north-west of Kathmandu and flows south and then south-west of Marsyangdi River. it then follows south to the Terai.

This is even good for inexperienced persons bacause it is gentle one. it will take 3-7 days a trip in trishuli River.

Sunkoshi river

The Sunkoshi flows southward from the himalaya and then turns west and flows right across Nepal. The Sunkoshi ans the river which join into it flow down from some of the highest mountains of the Homalaya. Rafting trip goes through a variety of country, includin widw valleys and deep gorges, and past small villages where dugout canoes are used as transport across the river. From the mountain pines forests in the high country you evenually emerge in the green and fertile lowlands of Terai.

Kaligandaki River

The Kaligandaki river, flowing south between Annapurna and Dhaulagiri and then turning west to the Narayani just north of Narayanghat, is not used as much as the Trishuli and Sunkoshi River.Nepal – map rafting rivers :

I would like to invite you to watch absolutely amazing movie :

Highlights of trip from Kathmandu to Lhasa : Nepal & Tibet – amazing movie.

A WINTER EXPEDITION TO K2

By Andrzej Zawada
All photos copyright Andrzej Zawada
[Translated by Ingeborg Duubrawn-Cochlin]

Broad Peak

In Alpine Style to Broad Peak.

When I proposed the K2 project to the Polish Mountaineering Association, I made it more attractive by suggesting that there was a possibility of an attempt on Broad Peak at the same time . Both these peaks can be climbed from the same base Camp. Because of the complications when applying for permission to climb the K2, it had been advantageous not to mention additional plans for Broad Peak. Later at the end of February, Aleksander Lwow approached me asking if he could make a solo attempt at Broad Peak. Since I knew Aleksander very well, I did not take his suggestion very seriously. But later when Maciej Berbeka announced his willingness to join Lwow to climb together, I knew their decision was a responsible one. I agreed to allow them provided we obtained permission.

During the next phase of organizing the expedition, I experienced problems in including Lwow in our team – because he was facing disciplinary action for twice breaking the rules by climbing Lhotse and Chouyu without permission.

I turned for help to the Polish Ambassador Mr. Jan W. Piekarski, who managed to obtain permission from the Pakistani authorities in just eighteen hours.

Berbeka and Lwow attacked Broad Peak in alpine style. Loaded with very heavy rucksacks, they left Base Camp on 3rd March climbing the icy slopes very carefully . They established their first bivouac at 6,000m, the second at 6,500m and the last one at 7,300m on the edge of the ice fields under the summit dome. From here without their loads they started for the summit on 6th March. The weather that day was exceptionally beautiful. We followed their every move through binoculars. They gained height very quickly. At about 3:300 p.m., when they were near the col, Lwow came on the walkie talkie and told us he had decided to turn back because he was exhausted. While he made his descent, Berbeka continued alone towards the summit. We watched him on the rocky ridge climbing quickly and confidently. Then he disappeared from view as the ridge flattened out at this point. After about half an hour we heard his voice over the radiotelephone saying: ” I am on the summit, the wind is blowing very hard. If I do not reach the tent before nightfall I shall bivouac in a snow hole.

We could not see anything anymore. The weather started to change rapidly and clouds covered everything. Darkness came. The wind was blowing harder by the hour. All night long we listened on the radiotelephone but Berbeka Maciek spoke only once to tell us that he was sitting in a snow hole under the col.

The following day, the weather was appalling. Maciek spoke to us from time to time with great effort to let us know what he was doing and how he was. He was unable to find the tent in the thick mist and he was starting to loose sensation in his toes. Night was approaching. Just before darkness, the visibility improved, and it became clearer for a few moments . Maciek spotted the tent and started to descend towards it, but again a thick mist closed in and covered everything. He started to shout and Lwow heard him. In the meantime, Dasal, Gardzielewski and Wicklicki had started out from the Base Camp to help. They met the two climbers coming down slowly. Maciek was rescued.

When he had reached the summit, Maciek was convinced that he stood on the main peak on the long ridge of Broad Peak. On the basis of the picture he had taken, the experts later stated that he had reached the slightly lower summit called the Rocky Summit or Rocky Broad Peak at 8035m – just 11 meters short of the top.

What does that really mean? Only a few meters difference on the very long ridge of Broad Peak after seven dramatic days exposed on Broad Peak in winter?

Failure is very bitter but it makes you reflect more on the situation than the euphoric state of victory.

From those tense, exhausting weeks when we were idle at Base Camp struggling against those constant, devastating hurricanes, we learnt respect for our partners, who in spite of these life-threatening conditions were able to preserve their spirit with a smile or an encouraging word which meant so much at times like that. The pressure of desperate situations and dangerous conditions reveal a person’s real character. The weak blame others for their failure and become heroes only when they return to the safety of their own homes.

With good partners it is easier to accept defeat. The important thing is to experience together the adventure and unusual atmosphere up there in the high mountains which brings us together and which will be remembered in years to come long after we have lost the ability and strength to rope ourselves together anymore.

Incidentally, it is good that the mountains still teach humility to human beings particularly in this day and age, when people think we can conquer nature completely. K2 in winter still remains a challenge.