I don’t think my team would have casualties that high. Remember, they would be very experienced, and not interested in achieving the summit. They would take their chances, but in the event of a team death their estates would participate in all the revenue for that season.
If you would like to partner with mem I am of course open to suggestions if you have better ones than I am making.
We would not refund money. The contract would state that we agree to make a best effort according to our sole determination within the bounds of our risk tolerance. We agree to try and rescue your loved one, but we have no intention of dying to do so.
From what I’ve read a lot of people die on the mountain who are potentially savable. This occurs because there is nobody there with the purpose of accomplishing rescues. Nobody wants to give up their chance to summit and use up their supplies and energy trying to help somebody else.
If you’re at the lower camps you’re not much use to the folks up high. If you’re at the higher camps, you can’t stay long and would have to shuttle down regularly. The resource costs would be incredibly high, and you’d crowd the already over crowded path where bottlenecks are critical hazards.
The Sherpa teams supporting the climbing groups are already the rescue teams in place.
See, that’s the key to my hare-brained scheme. People can’t stay at the high camps very long (and stay in any kind of useful climbing condition) because getting oxygen up is so freakin’ labor intensive. If you were able to refill bottles up there, you could have rescue teams stationed for longer periods. That also means climbers making summit pushes could carry more oxygen at a higher flow rate, which makes them much less likely to get into trouble in the first place. (The commercial guide services will often provide extra oxygen for the summit attempt for a large extra fee.)
And sure, the availability of S&R and medical services changes peoples’ assessment of risk, but I’d ask for a cite for situations where resources get “overwhelmed” by inexperienced climbers. Plus presumably the very tight permit requirements by the Nepalese and even stingier Chinese authorities would still be there.
Apart from the practical considerations, only rescuing people who paid in advance would likely be seen as ethically questionable.
I don’t believe this is true. Even with bottled oxygen, you are limited to how much time you can spend up their without deteriorating rapidly. There are other physiological changes going on that just having bottled oxygen won’t address. You might do better if you put people in pressure suits but that’s even more impractical. Maybe there is technology that would allow that, I don’t know.
Having more bottled oxygen up there is very helpful, but climbers can’t carry more than 2-3 cylinders. Having 50 extra bottles is of no use if you can’t carry them. So you’ll still end up with climbers running out along the way from Camp 4 to the summit. Modern cylinders are better, but I don’t think we’ll get to point where someone can carry enough to ensure they have full oxygen for the summit push any time soon.
Most climbing teams have Sherpas already in the high camps who are acclimatized properly and equipped to provide aid and rescue for the clients. Proper climbing teams hold some in reserve to be available in case something goes wrong. Not all teams do this very well.
This is a weird question but couldn’t everyone who passes one of these bodies just toss it down the mountain from wherever they are? Eventually it’ll get close to the bottom right?
They are frozen deeply into permanent ice. Those bodies aren’t going anywhere (not the ones up high, anyway.) Briton George Mallory’s (who may or may not have reached the summit in 1924) body was found in 1999 at almost 28,000 feet frozen in the ice.
Nope, you don’t need a pressure suit. The partial pressure of oxygen at sea level is about 3 PSI. The total atmospheric pressure at 30,000 ft is about 4.3 PSI. 34,000 feet is about where the atmospheric pressure is around 3 PSI, so if you breathed pure oxygen there it’d be physiologically equivalent to breathing at sea level. HACE and HAPE and other forms of mountain sickness are all related to the amount of oxygen in the lungs/bloodstream, not pressure. Decompression sickness could be a problem if you went directly from a pressurized body of some sort to high altitude, but just being at 30,000 feet doesn’t cause any problems beyond hypoxia.
(In aviation 43,000 feet is considered the altitude at which the lungs can’t get enough oxygen even with a 100% o2, so you need a pressurized mask (and uncomfortable pressure breathing procedures.) You only absolutely need a pressure suit above around 50,000 feet, at which point your lungs can’t expel CO2. (Cite: Nasa’s Dressing for Altitude ebook.)
Now, obviously even with GreasyJack’s South Col Fillin’ Station nobody’s going to be breathing pure oxygen, but there’s lots of room between the meager amount climbers normally supplement now and how much more they could if they had a ready supply of oxygen at the high camp.
Mallory may be frozen in ice for part of the year, but he is not frozen in ice year-round; do an image search on “George L Mallory body.”
Also try googling “Hannelore Schmatz” for a case where was a body was I guess frozen unnervingly in place in a seated position with hair blowing in the wind in clear sight of anyone taking that route to the summit. The ice eventually gave up its grip, and Schmatz’s body was blown over the side of the mountain. Very sadly two sherpas died trying to retrieve her lifeless remains before she was blown irretrievably away.
Some bodies are not permanently frozen in the ice, as Nelson says. But the bodies do freeze solidly. If later it is blown off the mountain and falls, it can shatter much like an ice cube shatters when thrown against a rock. This does not conjure pretty images.
Many are no doubt in places where they tried to take shelter before dying, which would make them more difficult to move.
What’s your object, to retrieve them or simply move them out of sight? Tossing them down the mountain (if it could be done) won’t bring them back to Base Camp. They’ll either go off a cliff somewhere and end up in an even more unretrievable spot, or fall into a crevasse. So that only makes sense if you want to disappear them.
wow, that picture is great!! Go visit inside the tent, located in the second lowest green box, once inside, you can rotate around and see pictures on the walls, with more green squares to zoom into, art shots etc…
Roof of the World…awesome…
ps just ban the bottles, gotta make it on lung power, that should limit the crowds…
Well it seems that retrieving them is sometimes dangerous, and moving them out of sight doesn’t accomplish the goal of eventually removing those bodies.
Actually, Mallory’s body likely moved quite a bit since his death. He was found in a small basin a long way off the climbing route which also contained several other bodies of more recent vintage. Presumably they all died at various points along the climbing route, but the nature of the prevailing winds and topography moved them to that particular place.
