High winds were in the forecast from multiple services and internet sites, but some teams either didn’t believe them or ignored them and made a summit push on Tuesday, May 15 – around fifty people turned back, and two climbers have been missing for days. Almost every team is targeting this weekend for their summit push; thus, we can anticipate significant crowding.
High winds have hampered the search for the two Mongolian climbers missing since May 12th: Usukhjargal Tsedendamba, 31 and Purevsuren Lkhagvajav, 53. They were climbing together without supplemental oxygen or Sherpa support.
Unbelievably, around 50 people turned back after attempting to summit on May 12 with winds gusting to 50mph. The top limit for the best teams is 30 mph. Why expedition leaders choose to put their clients in obvious danger is beyond me. That said, it’s well documented how some operators have a different risk tolerance than others. We’ve seen this many times, for example, last autumn on Manaslu when every Western operator abandoned their climbs after seeing several deaths due to avalanches and continuing heavy snowfall and high winds. At the same time, all of the Nepali operators stayed for an extended time to make more attempts before eventually reaching the same conclusion.
As expected, the new rules announced earlier are having little impact. For example, the ban on helicopters for non-emergencies is simply ignored. In an IG post, Eduard Kubatov explains that climbers turned back on their summit push due to the forecasted high winds, and some took helicopters back to EBC.
The high winds are expected to ease as we move closer to the weekend, but serious concerns are brewing. With May 19th -21st as the sweet spot (low winds), crowds become an issue since high summit winds have kept people off the summit this week. So if everyone targets May 19th -21st, look for masses to push to be in position at C2 and the Col by the 18th. It appears that almost every team still at EBC is targeting this weekend for summits, with a few exceptions.
On Everest, there have been about 93 summits thus far, with 414 permits issued to foreigners.
Climb On!
Alan
Memories are Everything
Podcasts
You can listen to #everest2024 podcasts on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Breaker, YouTube, Pocket Casts, RadioPublic, Anchor, and more. Just search for “alan arnette” on your favorite podcast platform.
Everyday Everest
A 16-part podcast series during the Everest 2024 climbing season.
Based on my Fictional 2020 Virtual Everest series, I posted a twenty-minute updated episode a few times a week throughout this season. Everyday Everest follows a fictional team of nine climbers and their personal Sherpas from leaving home to trekking to base camp, acclimatizing, and finally, on their summit push. The story’s protagonist, Harper, sets the tone for the story when she tells her husband, Marc, “Honey, I’m going to climb Everest.”
You can listen to Everyday Everest on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Breaker, YouTube, Pocket Casts, RadioPublic, Anchor, and more. Just search for “alan arnette” on your favorite podcast platform.
Previous Everyday Everest Episodes
- Everyday Everest Podcast Part 16–Home and The End
- Everyday Everest Podcast Part 15–Summit!!
- Everyday Everest Podcast Part 14–Summit Push
- Everyday Everest Podcast Part 13–Climbing Above Camp 3
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 12–Summit Plan for the Team
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 11–First Summits
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 10–Climbing the Lhotse Face
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 9–Summit Date Planned
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 8–Suffering at Camp 2
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 7–Into the Cwm
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 6–Into the Icefall
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 5–Arrival At Base Camp
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 4–Blessing in the Khumbu
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 3–The Trek Begins
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 2–Hello Kathmandu
- Everyday Everest Podcast Series Part 1–Welcome and Part 1
Preparing for Everest is more than Training
There are five Summit Coach clients on Everest in 2024
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