If You Like Having Vertigo, You'll Love This

Came across some YouTube videos of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, taken at or near the top.

Holy shit. These things scare the hell out of me, and I am sitting here at home.









Someday some idiot will bungee jump from there.

Speaking of heights, there's always the summit of Mount Everest to get the vertigo going:



Or K2:

Obituaries

Achille Compagnoni, a mountaineer who was one of the first two men to reach the summit of the deadly K2, has died at the ripe old age of 94.

He and climbing partner Lino Lacedelli reached the summit of the legendary deadly mountain in 1954:

Mr. Compagnoni and his fellow climber Lino Lacedelli were part of an Italian team that conquered the mountain on July 31, 1954. K2 is in the border region of northern Pakistan and China. The expedition, of more than a dozen members, had been organized by the explorer and geologist Ardito Desio, who died in 2001.

It “was one of the last acts of heroic mountaineering,” Reinhold Messner, a renowned Italian mountain climber, told the news agency ANSA this week. “Compagnoni,” Mr. Messner added, “was a physically strong climber, with a lot of heart and big lungs.”

Lacedelli is still alive. He is 83 years old.
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Basketball great Wayman Tisdale, only 44, of cancer.

He suffered from the same cancer, osteosarcoma, as Canadian runner/hero Terry Fox (1958-1981).
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Mountain Madness

Even though there might have been faulty equipment on K2 partly responsible for last Friday's tragedy killing 11 climbers, in the end the disaster probably couldn't be avoided unless they hadn't bothered climbing it in the first place.

Mountain Madness

Poor equipment and a porter's mistake were to blame for the tragedy on K2 according to survivor Marco Confortola:

Confortola said poor equipment — including ropes and spikes that broke — as well as sloppiness and inexperience were partly to blame for the disaster. A Dutch survivor, Wilco Van Rooijen, has said advance climbers laid ropes in some of the wrong places, including in a treacherous gully known as "The Bottleneck," about 1,150 feet below the summit, where the avalanche later took place.

It goes beyond saying nobody should have been up there in the first place, but that's pretty obvious.
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Mountain Madness

I found these really interesting articles about K2 while surfing around the internet. Both links are from Outside magazine:

The Mountain of Mountains. This article is really good.

Take a look at the picture of K2 on the first page of the article. It is enough to give one vertigo. Note how steep it is. It juts straight up. No wonder mountaineers call it the toughest climb in the world.

This page of links is about the 1995 K2 tragedy which cost several mountaineers their lives including Alison Hargreaves.
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Considering all Marco Confortola went through, he is in surprisingly good shape. AP has some photos of him. His toes are bluish-gray from frostbite.
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Of course it isn't just men anymore who take stupid risks to climb mountains like K2; more women are doing it, including Cecilie Skog, who became the tenth woman to successfully climb the summit of K2 and the seventh to actually survive the descent. Her husband, Rolf Bae, climbed with her but died up there.

It IS dumb; people who do this are vying for inclusion in the Darwin Awards hall of fame. The Himalayan/Karakorum mountains should be left alone. ALL of the highest peaks have been climbed; there are few or no more "firsts" to accomplish.
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More Mountain Madness

Marco Confortola has been airlifted from K2.

It was pure chaos in the final push to climb the mountain last Friday.

Mountain Madness [Updated]

Marco Confortola is glad to be alive after his harrowing experience on the descent of K2. He's doing okay, other than having frostbite on his feet.

He is at base camp now waiting for the helicopter to take him from the mountain.

More:

Pakistan has listed 11 climbers missing and believed dead: three South Koreans, two Nepalis, two Pakistanis and mountaineers from France, Ireland, Serbia and Norway.

One of the rescued Dutchmen, Wilco Van Rooijen, blamed mistakes in preparation for the final ascent — not just the avalanche — for one of mountaineering's worst disasters.

Van Rooijen told The Associated Press on Monday that advance climbers laid ropes in some of the wrong places, including in a treacherous gully known as "The Bottleneck," about 1,150 feet below the summit.

That caused hours of delays, so climbers only reached the summit just before nightfall. The column of ice fell as the fastest mountaineers descended.

Base camp has facilities like oxygen and drugs to help Confortola until the helicopter comes.

I think being crazy or having a death wish not to mention a giant ego is part of what drives people to do something as stupid as climbing the Karakorum or Himilayan mountains.

It's all about bragging rights. Of course the eleven who died on K2 no longer have that.

Nicholas Rice's blog is here. Because he spilled boiling water on his socks, Rice didn't go up the mountain with his fellow climbers; as a result of his mishap, he is alive today.

Another update: Are extreme mountaineers just simply out of their minds?

Mountain Madness [Updated]

The death toll from Friday's avalanche on Pakistan's K2 mountain is 11 so far:

The Pakistani military launched a rescue operation early Monday, using two helicopters.

“Two Dutch climbers were rescued today from the base camp,” Major Khan said. “They are in an injured condition and very afraid.” Three other injured survivors were in stable condition, he said.

“Four climbers are still coming down,” Major Khan said. “Among them, one Italian is in critical condition. He will be rescued tomorrow.” The mountaineers were still at a high altitude, which made it difficult to reach them with helicopters, Major Khan explained.

The report says there were twenty climbers on this expedition instead of the 22 originally reported.

An ice avalanche killed the mountaineers:

The disaster happened when a huge chunk of ice slid from a steep gully known as the Bottleneck near the summit and swept away the mountaineers ropes.

Swedish climber Fredrik Straeng said he feared for his life when a Pakistani climber fell on top of him.
"I was terrified he would pull us all off the cliff and screamed to him to use his ice axe, but he lost his grip and plummeted off a 300-metre cliff," Straeng said.

So far bad weather has kept helicopter pilots from rescuing Italian climber Marco Confortola.

At the same BBC link, mountaineer Alan Hinkes talks about K2. He's climbed it, but you couldn't pay him enough money to do it again. He notes it is impossible for helicopters to go up higher than 6,000 meters, as the altitude of K2 and Everest is the same altitude that jumbo jets fly.

Climber Terrance Bannon also talks about the events surrounding the tragedy. He's also climbed K2 and knows some who were on the mountain this weekend.

From the BBC link is this diagram of K2 showing the different points on it, including the infamous "Bottleneck":



Update: Marco Confortola, the stranded Italian climber, is alive:

The Italian climber, Marco Confortola, descended to 20,340 feet but bad weather forced officials to abort a helicopter rescue Monday, said Shahzad Qaiser, a top official at the tourism ministry. He was climbing down on foot, despite frostbite, assisted by a support team from a base camp.

"Up there it was hell. During the descent, beyond 8,000 meters (26,000 feet), due to the altitude and the exhaustion I even fell asleep in the snow and when I woke up I could not figure out where I was," the ANSA news agency quoted Confortola as telling his brother Luigi by satellite phone.

"My hands are fine, while my feet are black from frostbite. Anyway, I can walk and I want to descend to the base camp."

Some facts about K2, including why it is called that instead of Godwin-Austen or Chogori, other names for the mountain.

Another update: One of the Dutch survivors talks about the tragedy.

Van Rooijen, 40, who had attempted K2 twice before, said climbers ignored his pleas for calm. "They were thinking of using my gas, my rope," he said. "Everybody was fighting for himself, and I still do not understand why everybody were leaving each other."

Most of the victims were experienced climbers. Rolf Bae, a Norwegian believed swept away in the avalanche, was climbing with his wife, Cecilie Skog. The couple are renowned polar explorers and were making their second attempt on K2.

Skog was reportedly making her way down.

While most of those on K2 were believed to be highly experienced, some survivors questioned the judgment of fellow climbers. Van Rooijen told the Associated Press that some ropes had been laid improperly across a gully and required laborious repositioning. Delays meant some teams reached the summit after 8 p.m., requiring them to descend in the dark, a far more dangerous undertaking.

More.

Names of the dead and injured:

1. Mr. Kim Hyo - Gyeong Korean

2. Mr. Park Kyeong - Hyo Koream

3. Mr. Hwang Dong - Jin Korean

4. Mr. Jumic Bhote Napali

5. Mr. Pasang Bhote Napali

6. Mr. Jehan Baig Pakistan HP

7. Mr. Meherban Karim Pakistani HP

8. Mr. D'aubarede Hugues Jean - Louis Marie French

9. Mr. Gerard McDonnell Irish

10. Mr. Dren Mandic Serbian

11 Mr. Rolf Bae Norwegian

Injured persons are;

Mr. Wilco van Rooijen Dutch

Mr. Cas van de Gevel Dutch

Mr. Marco Confortola Italian

link

Mountain Madness [Updated]

At least nine climbers are feared dead and five others are missing on the deadly Pakistan peak K2, a mountain I have written a couple of posts about.

K2 has always had a reputation for being a killer peak, not only because it is the second-highest mountain in the world after Everest, but it is constantly plagued by terrible weather.

An avalanche is the cause of this, the worst tragedy on the mountain in history. The climbers were on descent from the summit when the avalanche occurred. There were 22 total in the climbing group, which was made up mostly of foreigners.

I am sure more updates will be found on this site.

Update: This article claims K2 is the hardest of the 8,000-meter mountains (the 14 highest mountains in the world, all located in the Himalayan-Karakorum range) to climb. That may be true, but it isn't the deadliest of the 8,000-meter mountains; that dubious honor goes to Annapurna. It was the first of the "8000-ers" to be climbed, but comparatively few people have ever made the attempt. It has a fatality rate of 40%. According to Wikipedia, only 103 successful summits have ever been made, with 56 deaths (many to avalanches).

Another update: Here is a report including a review of previous K2 disasters, specifically the 1986 and 1995 tragedies. Of particular note is three women who had successfully climbed K2 (Julie Tullis, Liliane Barrard, and Alison Hargreaves) died on descent. The article notes this mountain is particularly dangerous on descent.

Update three: The BBC has a video report.

Mountaineer Chris Bonnington gives his take on the tragedy.

Celebrated mountaineer Reinhold Messner, the first person to climb all 14 of the 8,000-meter peaks, blames commercial mountaineering for the tragedies.