Guiding Everest is not morally defensible

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Don Paul

Big Wall climber

Colombia, South America

Jun 1, 2012 - 05:59pm PT

No way Ron. It's pathetic.

Hannes

climber

Jun 1, 2012 - 06:10pm PT

I find it quite extraordinary that it seems from reading accounts of people climbing it their first meeting with their guide (western) is either in Kathmandu or even BC. I guess it is simply too much prestige and money involved in guiding everest to weed the clients in a harsher way.

A friend of mine was telling me a bit about a customer he had in the shop he works in and I used to work in. He was an overweight saudi man who wanted to climb everest but had absolutely no experience. Somehow he'd found someone after all the reputable and less reputable guides had turned him down. The man was paying $100k to be guided up everest by a man who had himself never been above 6000m. In the shop he needed a basic tutorial on the equipment for high altitude climbing by my friend (who has climbed everest among other 8000m peaks, so much for it being only rich people climbing it). Apparently this far from the only such person to come into the shop as it is a bit of a go to shop for people with more money than sense doing those kinds of things.

I confess, I have seen the discovery show and from that there were clearly a number of people being guided that would have been fine without a guide but happily paid to avoid the hassle and to have someone take charge. Is it immoral to guide these people? I think not, the man from Saudi though. That is completely immoral so I guess it boils down to guiding numpties on everest is not morally defensible

zBrown

Ice climber

mercenario de merced

Jun 1, 2012 - 06:13pm PT

Surfer Mickey Munoz:

"there are no bad waves, only a poor choice of equipment"

Mr. C. W. Jones
"there are no bad climbers, just bad Sherpa selection"

Scarce resources always tend to get rationed somehow. You can't just go do the Ironman event in Hawaii, you gotta qualify, even though the orignal guys would have liked to have had a few more competitors along.

Lottery in 4 (years).

John Moosie

climber

Beautiful California

Jun 2, 2012 - 01:00am PT

And no juggling equipment. Made navigation in a white out difficult.

Tami Tami Tameeeh. You need to get caught up in the latest in gyroscopic navigational juggling equipment. Of course he was juggling, that is how you keep the gyroscope spinning and how he could find his way in a whiteout. Its the latest thing, though only a military model and a sleds over Eveerst model exist.

I don't know how this guy got ahold of a model. Ron,, have you been selling our secret equipment for beer money again?

Stewart Johnson

climber

lake forest

Jun 2, 2012 - 11:02pm PT

doesnt really mean poop all of us armchairing everest here.
whilst in lhasa people are lighting themselves on fire for freedom for
tibet.

not to mention the good ol usa droid bombing civilians in pakistan.

a couple of frozen climbers and some extra cash for nepal strikes me as a good thing.

Jan

Mountain climber

Okinawa, Japan

Jun 6, 2012 - 04:56am PT

There is a good article in the New York Times Today on the political abyss
in Nepal and its impending status as a failed state. At the rate things are
going, nobody is going to climb Everest if the chaos continues.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/06/opinion/nepal-on-the-brink-of-collapse.html?_r=1&hp

donini

Trad climber

Ouray, Colorado

Topic Author's Reply - Jun 6, 2012 - 08:10am PT

Hopefully out of all of this chaos a better state will emerge. A beautiful land, beautiful people....they deserve better.

juar

Sport climber

socal

Jun 30, 2012 - 08:26am PT

thats there is

interesting story about the clientele who buy their way onto the mountain these days

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2166303/Arsonist-Michael-Marin-53-collapses-dies-Phoenix-court-guilty.html?ICO=most_read_module

Mighty Hiker

climber

Vancouver, B.C.

Jun 30, 2012 - 12:30pm PT

iep's photo upthread has a bold green line. It isn't a route, but there is a route on that part of the mountain, the North Face direct, done by the Russians in 2004. As with their (unrepeated?) 1982 route on the southwest face, and their recent route on K2, one of the hardest on the mountain.

A major hazard was climbers on the northeast ridge throwing off oxygen bottles and other crap, which fell in the Russians' vicinity - until word got around.

http://www.alpinist.com/doc/ALP08/climbing-note-everest

Don Paul

Big Wall climber

Colombia, South America

Jul 2, 2012 - 01:38pm PT

Mountaineering teams in dispute over Everest 'summit certificates'

Pathetic wankers!

TWP

Trad climber

Mancos, CO

Nov 23, 2012 - 10:03am PT

I offer more fuel to support Donini's point.

I just finished watching the Discovery channel's six-part series "Everest" covering a 2006 commercial trip up the Tibet-north side of the hill.

Talk about a gang of misfits. The clients include a 62 year old Frenchman just a few weeks post surgery to remove a cancerous kidney, an ex-Hell's Angels from LA with a lot of metal holding his spine and legs together post motorcycle crashes, a double amputee from New Zealand (who qualifies as the most experienced mountaineer amongst the clients, having lost both legs to frostbite in 1982 while stormbound on NZ's Mt. Cook for 13 days), a Lebanese businessman in pursuit of the "Seven Summits," an American doctor (there is one in every gang of idiots spending a lot of money it seems), an LA jock Fireman, a super fit Danish asthmatic who wants to summit without oxygen.

Did anyone with the cash get turned away by this outfit? Talk about a dream team! (On second thought, I beat a Hollywood producer for the Discovery channel selected this team for dramatic story lines!)

On the mountain, each client has his own Sherpa and the route to the summit has fixed routes and established camps well stocked with oxygen (all courtesy of the Sherpa Army). In fact, a Sherpa team summitted, fixed lines, placed copious numbers of oxygen cycliners so very high clients could "reload" on the descent ABOVE all the "technical" difficulties and established all the camps BEFORE the clients began their push from advanced base camp. Talk about stacking the deck. No wonder the Hell's Angel's biker NEARLY summitted, turning back about 300 meters from top, but only after the leader can forced into pleading, begging and prodding the moron to turn around over the course of approximately two hours before the knucklhead turned around (and then only because another "biker dude" told him to do so. The orders, pleading and begging from the expedition leader wasn't enough to save face, but apparently "Hey Dude, you've done enough; go down" from a fellow biker gave him the cover to descend, manhood uncontestably preserved.

Then on the summit push an up=to 23-person cluster of Chinese, Indian and Turkish climbers created log jams at the ladder/bottleneck both on ascent and descent. The team grumbles and bitches about "incompetent" climbers blocking their way. Talk about the kettle calling the pot black.

The team's toll for their combination of summits and near-misses is a kitty litter box of fingers, toes and a few more inches of amputated stumps lost to frostbite. Why the Hell's Angel dude doesn't die is beyond me given his repeated stupidities richly documented throughout, both obvious and subtle.

Like I said, for more reenforcement of Donini's point, catch this documentary made possible in painstaking detail via the helmet-mounted cameras and microphones worn by the Sherpas throughout the ordeal. Of course, the carnival will never stop - until the endless supply of wealthy adventures seekers who thinking climbing Everest is a big deal has been exhauted - not likely soon or ever!

Vitaliy M.

Mountain climber

San Francisco

Nov 23, 2012 - 11:19am PT

On the mountain, each client has his own Sherpa and the route to the summit has fixed routes and established camps well stocked with oxygen (all courtesy of the Sherpa Army).

Then on the summit push a cluster of Chinese, Indian and Turkish climbers create log jams at the ladder/bottleneck both on ascent and descent. The team grumbles and bitches about "incompetent" climbers blocking their way. Talk about the kettle calling the pot black.

What a surprise. At least it's not like guiding on El Cap. Wankers jugging up a fixed line, while on top rope. Wooooooooooooooo jugged the big stone! At least on Everest those prize seekers get to do the walking on their own. I don't understand why don't they make a strong helicopter that would take people to the summit for 50,000$. Similar accomplishment, but takes a lot less time.

climbski2

Mountain climber

Anchorage AK, Reno NV

Nov 23, 2012 - 11:23am PT

Uhm.. not so fast Vitaly.. Plenty of fixed lines set by sherpa's up there. I'm not even sure you can say the Guides "climb the mountain" anymore.

The Sherpa's may be the only climbers left up there.

Vitaliy M.

Mountain climber

San Francisco

Nov 23, 2012 - 11:24am PT

both spots are sh#t shows

TWP

Trad climber

Mancos, CO

Nov 23, 2012 - 02:56pm PT

^^^ per Climb2ski

"… I'm not even sure you can say the Guides "climb the mountain" anymore"

This point is well documented in the aforesaid mentioned Discovery channel documentary from the 2006 season.