If you haven’t read Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, a personal account of a 1996 Mt. Everest disaster, you should. [Please visit Read This, right margin]
Because, if you were ever to climb a mountain, or apply its lessons to other areas of life, you would be the wiser for it.
I read it recently and learned a bit about why Rob Hall, a very responsible, skilled leader from New Zealand, made a tragic mistake on Everest’s summit.
Many of his colleagues have wondered: “Why didn’t he turn Hansen (a client) around much lower on the mountain, as soon as it became obvious that the American climber was running late?”
Here’s what Krakauer reveals:
Exactly one year earlier, Hall had turned Hansen around on the South Summit at 2:30 P.M., and to be denied so close to the top was a crushing disappointment to Hansen. He told me several times that he’d returned to Everest in 1996 largely as a result of hall’s advocacy - he said Rob had called him from New Zealand “a dozen times” urging him to give it another try - and this time Doug was absolutely determined to bag the top.”
“I want to get this thing done and out of my life,” he’d told me three days earlier at Camp Two. “I don’t want to have to come back here. I’m getting too old for this shit.”
It doesn’t seem far-fetched to speculate that because Hall had talked Hansen into coming back to Everest, it would have been especially hard for him to deny Hansen the summit a second time. pg. 293
Guy Cotter, a NZ guide, said this:
“It’s very difficult to turn someone around high on the mountain. If a client sees that the summit is close and they’re dead-set on getting there, they’re going to laugh in your face and keep going up.”
Peter Lev, veteran US guide, said this:
“We think that people pay us to make good decisions, but what people really pay for is to get to the top.”
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Is death too high a price to pay to get to the top?
Part 4 and conclusion will soon follow
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