Posted on 05/23/2006 8:42:02 AM PDT by Paddlefish
Mark Inglis, an amputee who conquered Mount Everest on artificial legs last week, yesterday defended his party's decision to carry on to the summit despite coming across a dying climber. As his team climbed through the "death zone," the area above 26,000 feet where the body begins to shut down, they passed David Sharp, 34, a stricken British climber who later died. His body remained on the mountain.
Mr. Inglis, 47, a New Zealander, said: "At 28,000 feet it's hard to stay alive yourself. He was in a very poor condition, near death. We talked about [what to do for him] for quite a lot at the time and it was a very hard decision. "About 40 people passed him that day, and no one else helped him apart from our expedition. Our Sherpas (guides) gave him oxygen. He wasn't a member of our expedition, he was a member of another, far less professional one." Mr. Sharp was among eight persons who have died on Everest this year, including another member of his group, a Brazilian. Dewa Sherpa, a manager at Asian Trekking, the Katmandu company that outfitted Mr. Sharp before his climb, said he had not taken enough oxygen and had no Sherpa guide.
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The company charges $6,000 to provide services as far as base camp -- far less than the $35,000 or more cost of guided trips to the summit. Other mountaineers have criticized the commercialism of climbing the 29,035-foot peak, with guides charging huge sums to climbers with minimal experience.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
I agree. Read it a long time before Everest.
Indeed. One of the historical problems with "assistance" in tort law. Nevertheless, once you have commenced the provision of aid, and you have the ability to continue with that aid, you can be held liable for injuries proximately caused by the failure to do so.
As I recall from the documentary on "Into Thin Air" there was one guy that was only about 300 yards (feet?) from camp but was already near death, frozen, etc. so they didn't recover him (everyone else was in bad shape too). Quite a bit later (the next day after the storm had passed?) he came crawling in to the amazement of his climbing group. He survived.
Opps- my bad. Read ALL the posts before posting! (Beck is who I'm thinking of).
I believe that was Bek Wethers ... Glenn would know.
At that height there is little you can do... you don't have the strength or resources to carry them down..... You could sit and console them, but likely wind up dying on the mountain with them come nightfall.
This is reality folks... You decide to do something like this, it is a life or death decision... period.
I wasn't there so I can't guess the condition he was in when they found him.
Perhaps they gave him some oxygen in an attempt to revive him. When he didn't respond they knew they could do nothing for him.
The person to ask would be the leader of either expedition.
However, what you see from this view is not the true summit, but a "false peak" known as the South Summit.
Here's what you see when you get to the top of the South Summit.
Notice the size of the climber and the limited space he has on the ridge.
How are you going to get an immobile body down that when it takes you 15-30 seconds just to lift one foot ahead of the other?
Review this thread and carefully read the detailed descriptions of how much oxygen they actually had, how it was used, and what the recipient thereof has to do to make use of it. You're missing a lot of non-intuitive details about high-altitude oxygen usage.
As for your comment on torts:
Obligatory continuation of aid does not, and can not, apply where the giver thereof needs that resource for their own survival. Resources of oxygen, heat, and even footing were already tenuous for each climber. As noted earlier: in the "death zone", each step requires serious concerted effort. If multiple teams abandonded the poor guy, I'm inclined to give benefit of the doubt to triage.
Tragic, yes. The risks and consequences were known, and the result is the reality of such risks.
Quite possibly correct, but rescues have been undertaken on Everest above 8,000 meters. Interesting story here:
http://climb.mountainzone.com/2001/story/html/hahn_everest.html
Some people ought to stick to stamp collecting!
Thats the one I was talking about earlier in the thread... Time flies! I thought it was last year or two years ago... Not 5!
Ping to post 211. I remain unconvinced by the argument that "I couldn't render aid because I could barely put one foot in front of the other -- so I had to continue on to the top."
"Apparently someone helped him off the mountain so he could have his legs amputated, but he wouldn't pass the courtesy of an attempt to another human being."
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Hmmmmm, very good point~!
"Apparently someone helped him off the mountain so he could have his legs amputated, but he wouldn't pass the courtesy of an attempt to another human being."
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Hmmmmm, very good point~!
The funny thing is, I’m too lazy to walk up my stairs in 72 degrees weather.
These guys are a different breed of people.
Interesting story indeed.
Note that the rescuee could walk. Yes, in that remarkable story of rescue above 8000m, the nearly-given-up-for-dead rescuee could walk, talk, rappel, etc.! Now contrast that with this thread, where the decedant wasn't going anywhere under his own power.
As I said, you could be correct. But I remain skeptical. And it appears that I am not the only one. This group (and, I am sure, the balance of the 40 people who stepped over the stricken climber on their way to the top) is in the position, as noted in the article, of "defending their decision," so someone is asking questions.
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