Three days after Saturday鈥檚 earthquake, all of the Everest climbers who had been stuck in Camps I and II have been flown down to Base Camp or beyond. In Kathmandu, people who were injured in the avalanche that struck Base Camp are beginning to get their bearings.
Rainier Mountaineering鈥檚 Dave Hahn, who had been trapped with his team and another roughly 180 climbers at Camp I, .听
鈥淲e each walked slowly through the obliterated camps, stopping to understand how much force had bent this or that bit of steel,鈥 he wrote. 鈥淲e finally understood the enormous death toll and the nature of the numerous injuries to the survivors.鈥
The evacuation required roughly 30 helicopter sorties over the Khumbu Icefall. Hahn, in his account, mentions that he was flown by Jason Laing, the same Kiwi Simrik Air pilot who performed most of the body recovery flights last year in the Icefall.
In the courtyard of Kathmandu鈥檚 Yak & Yeti Hotel, New York鈥揵ased filmmaker Michael Churton explained how he鈥檇 been injured in the avalanche. 鈥淚 just buried myself as best I could,鈥 he told the Washington Post. 鈥淓verything was gone. All our tents were gone. . . We鈥檙e missing one person, and we don鈥檛 know if she鈥檚 alive or dead.鈥 Churton, a filmmaker and producer who worked on last year鈥檚 Discovery/NBC production surrounding base jumper Joby Ogwyn, was documenting this year鈥檚 season from the Madison Mountaineering camp. The missing woman he described was New Jersey鈥揵ased physician鈥檚 assistant Eve Girawong, who was confirmed dead yesterday.
But as the stories of what happened on Mount Everest resolve into clarity, the tales from the less digitally connected mountains of the Nepalese Himalayas are only beginning to come to light. Many serious alpinists prefer these other areas to Everest and tend to travel lighter, without the cumbersome communications equipment that鈥檚 so common in Everest Base Camp.
Langtang, due north of Kathmandu and roughly 100 miles closer to the quake鈥檚 epicenter than Everest, was completely devastated by landslides that followed the quake. The Langtang Valley, extremely steep and narrow, is another popular trekking and climbing destination. Though there are no 8,000-meter peaks in the area, 26,289-foot Shishapangma sits just over the border into Tibet.
Bibek Khadka of Simrik Air told a local news outlet that villages up and down the Trishuli River had simply vanished: 鈥淲hile on our way to Syafrubeshi from Ghoda Tabela in Rasuwa, we saw some villages completely washed away by landslides while some others looked like deserts due to landslides.鈥
At the upper end of the Langtang Valley, Washington-based alpinist Colin Haley phoned his mother Terrin to let her know that he, his climbing partner, Frenchman Aymeric Clouet, and Clouet鈥檚 pregnant wife had all survived and were in no immediate danger. Ms. Haley emailed Alpinist magazine to relay the information. According to the , the villages suffered heavy casualties and Haley planned to stay and help while those injured were airlifted.听
huge amount of climbers waiting heli evacuation in base camps.
鈥 Northmen PK (@NorthmenPK)
Makalu, which sits 14 miles southeast of Everest and at 27,825-feet is the world鈥檚 fifth-tallest mountain, was also the scene of 聽serious avalanche activity. In a widely circulated video uploaded from the mountain鈥檚 advanced base camp (ABC), Indian mountaineer Arjun Vajpal reported that there were 鈥渜uite a few big avalanches coming down…and quite a bit of rock fall.鈥
Adrian Hayes, a British climber, posted to Facebook that as he was descending to ABC from Camp I he felt 鈥渢he mother of all avalanches,鈥 though he was unable to see through the whiteout conditions.
A blog post on the website of Swiss outfitter Kobler and Partners indicated that the avalanche had come from 聽Makalu鈥檚 north col. In the same post. Kobler鈥檚 office confirmed that everybody on the mountain was safe. In more recent videos, Vajpal also confirmed that everyone had made it back to base camp from higher on the mountain. A Facebook post from the The Belgian Makalu 2015 Expedition indicated that there were roughly 45 climbers on Makalu this spring.
Makalu 2015 鈥 Nepal Earthquake. Everyone on Makalu is safely back in Advanced Base Camp at 5700m after the 7.9 magnitude…
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On Annapurna, the world鈥檚 tenth-highest mountain at 26,545 feet, Canadian climber Al Hancock phoned home and left a voicemail describing a near-miss high on the mountain, in which he 鈥渉ad to use knives鈥 to get out of his nearly buried tent. Hancock鈥檚 publicist emailed an audio file of the call to 国产吃瓜黑料.
Part One:
Part Two:
鈥淲e were at basecamp 鈥 the sound that we heard was deafening, the whole mountain shook. The ground shook, people were running for their lives … It was a very scary experience. It鈥檚 a scary place to be. It鈥檚 a scary time 鈥 On the 23rd. we tried to make a summit attempt from Camp 4. Bad weather was coming in, and we had to turn around. We got back to Camp 4 and crawled in our sleeping bags to rest up and got hit as we were sleeping in a major avalanche. If it had lasted another four seconds, I wouldn鈥檛 be talking to you. I鈥檇 be buried alive along with my teammates. We had to cut ourselves out with knives 鈥 our team descended down to camp 3. We had another teammate who would be dead today, he was in rough shape, we had to do a rescue from Camp 4 to Camp 3, myself and two sherpas … We got him on oxygen 鈥 and the next morning we had a helicopter come in and do a long line rescue … to base camp 鈥 he鈥檚 in Kathmandu doing fine.鈥
It鈥檚 still unclear how many people were on Annapurna at the time of the avalanche. 聽
American climber Alexander Barber described the same scene on his website:
鈥淭he earthquake was so forceful, it felt as if we were inside a snow globe being shaken by God. The storm kept us from seeing much but we could hear avalanches ripping down everywhere. The roar was so loud I thought we鈥檇 surely be hit 鈥 At Base Camp, I found out that an avalanche had hit the team at camp 4 earlier that night. No one was hurt but they had to cut their way out of their tents.鈥
Also on Annapurna was Washington-based Jess Roskelley, son of pioneer American alpinist John Roskelley. The Spokesman Review, a newspaper in Spokane, Washington, reported that 鈥淛ess Roskelley, who鈥檚 on a filming expedition to climb Annapurna, the 10th highest peak in the world, has contacted friends and family and said he鈥檚 OK. Allison Spencer, Roskelley鈥檚 fiance in Spokane, said the group is in good shape at basecamp and waiting until conditions stabilize.鈥
After an encouraging turn of weather and permission to proceed, Chinese officials have just ordered all climbers off Cho…
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Other well-traveled mountains in the area include Dhaulagiri, where Italian climber Marco Confortola (a survivor of the 2008 K2 disaster) checked in safe, Manaslu, and Cho Oyu, which is typically climbed from the Chinese side of the border. Cho Oyu is popular among first-time 8,000 meter climbers. All expeditions there have reported that they鈥檙e in no immediate danger. Germany鈥檚 Amical reports on Facebook that all are safe, though they did feel a violent aftershock. A team from Satori Expeditions checked in OK as well, apparently encountered a close-call with an avalanche at high camp. American Dan Mazur and his team from Summit Climb also checked in OK from Cho Oyu.
We鈥檒l report more on the outlying expeditions in the coming days.