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Records tumble down with descending summiteers
It is a time of great excitement in Kathmandu. Extraordinary records are being set on Everest and broken just days later.
Kathmandu, May 26: It is a time of great excitement in Kathmandu. Extraordinary records are being set on Everest and broken just days later. The host of climbers on the mountain has been trying to take advantage of the brief weather window this past week and already the trickle of summiteers into Kathmandu has started.
Pemba Dorje Sherpa arrived here from the mountain yesterday and came straight to a felicitation of summiteers being held in the 350-year-old Durbar Square in the old city of Patan on the outskirts of Kathmandu. A crowd of 5000 that stood under the ancient temples with tiered canopies soaring into the sky, clapped and cheered for Pemba as he was honoured with a betali, the ceremonial white turban of the Newari clan of Nepal.
He had achieved a speed record for the fastest climb from base camp to summit on the south side. Pemba had done it in 12 hours and 45 minutes on May 23. The previous record on the south side was by Babu Chiri Sherpa (16 hours 56 minutes) in 2000. The fastest climb from BC to summit on the north side has been by Italian Hans Kammerlander (16 hours 45 minutes) in1996.
The 25-year-old Pemba, who works as a high altitude Sherpa, said that he could have climbed faster but for the fact that he was climbing the mountain from the south side for the first time and was unfamiliar with the route. He had earlier climbed it from the north (Tibet) side in 2000.
Pemba said it is possible to do the climb in nine to 10 hours. Prophetically, he said that if someone breaks his record, he would set a new one.
This morning, news arrived that another Sherpa, Lhakpa Gelu, might have broken Pemba's record with a climb that took 10 hours, 46 minutes. However, this is yet to be officially confirmed.
The spate of records began two days ago with Japanese Yuichiro Miura becoming the oldest man to summit Everest. Miura, who is 70, was already a legend as the first man to ski on Everest 33 years ago. He had skied down from South Col and had nearly got killed. Using a brake parachute to control speed, he had not taken into account the fact that the air at that altitude is too thin to deploy a parachute properly. The chute was useless and Miura fell, sliding down on his bottom and coming to a halt. He was injured but was lucky to be alive. In 2000, the ultimate feat in skiing on Everest was achieved when Slovenian Davo Karnicar skied from the summit to the base camp in nearly five hours.
As awesome as Miura's feat is that by US mountaineer Gary Guller, who has become the first one-armed person to summit Everest. The 36-year-old Guller lost his left arm in a climbing mishap in the 1980s. This was his second trip to Everest. The first was in 2001,
when he was deterred by an avalanche that took away fixed ropes laid in the Khumbu7 icefall.
The redoubtable Appa Sherpa has summitted for the 13th time in what has now become almost routine for the climbing world. He began his climbing career as a kitchen boy in 1985. Multiple ascents are common among the sherpas here. Indeed, Appa attracted attention only after he had completed his seventh ascent. He was then close on the heels of the legendary Ang Rita, who in 1996 had completed a historical 10 ascents - all without bottled oxygen.
Ang Rita was forced to retire from climbing due to lung problems and Appa went on to cross his record.
(Yana Bey is freelance journalist who is in love with the mountains. She is herself a mountaineer and has many friends among the fraternity of Everest summiteers. She is currently on an assignment to Kathmandu, Nepal, to cover the 50th anniversary celebration of the Hillary-Norgay climb.)
