Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster

The group sets off toward Camp Four—the final camp before the summit. Krakauer accidentally gets stuck at the back of a large group. He works to reach the front—not wanting to prolong his time in the elements. This requires carefully unclipping himself from the fixed rope and stepping around fellow climbers. Krakauer eventually reaches the South Col, a desolate clearing of ice and boulders above the Lhotse Face where Camp Four is located. Krakauer notes hundreds of discarded oxygen canisters littering the area. The wind howls. The group settles into their tents to try to sleep.

A member of the South African expedition, Bruce Herrod, calls to be let in and enters Kasischke, Weathers, Harris, and Hansen’s tent. He is hypothermic. Hansen is also unwell. He has not slept or eaten in days but is determined to summit the next day. The wind eventually dies down. Hall says that the group will indeed attempt the summit, leaving from Camp Four at 11:30 pm that night, May 9. The team—fifteen total including eight clients, three guides, and four Sherpas— quietly assemble their gear. They leave at the assigned time into the dark night. They are joined by Fischer’s Mountain Madness team which consists of three guides, five Sherpas, and six clients. The Taiwanese team start soon after with three Sherpas.

Krakauer is in pain from his cough, which caused a torn thoracic cartilage exacerbated at high altitude. He has eaten little and barely slept in days, but still appreciates the beauty of the mountain as they begin their ascent. Fischbeck decides to abandon the climb early on and returns to Camp Four. Hansen makes the same decision, but Hall persuades him to make the attempt. Krakauer reluctantly waits for slower climbers to catch up, having been instructed strictly by Hall that they must stay a close group at the beginning of the climb. Krakauer notices Lopsang, Fischer’s Sirdar, towing Pittman up the mountain on a rope. He notes that it looks awkward and unusual.

Krakauer notices Lopsang vomiting in the snow near the back of the line as he waits for Hall’s group to assemble.

Krakauer notices that no fixed line is installed on difficult sections of the summit; it is unknown why the Sherpas did not leave 90 minutes ahead of the group as planned. Lopsang, one of the two allocated to do this, is instead short-roping Pitman, towing her up the mountain on a rope. Ang Dorje and Krakauer wait for both Fischer and Hall’s groups to catch up, knowing that the ropes ahead still need to be installed. The clients arrive and a bottleneck forms as Beidleman, a guide from Fischer’s group, slowly installs the lines. Soon after, at 11:00 am, Kasischke and Hutchison, members of Rob’s group, understanding the need to not leave the summit too late, hear from Rob that the top is still three hours away, and opt to turn around. Two Sherpas accompany them.

Krakauer notices that neither Boukreev nor Lopsang are using bottled oxygen; Boukreev also does not have a backpack with ropes, first aid, or supplies. Beidleman, Harris, and Boukreev string ropes after sitting for a time; Krakauer helps. The group continues upward, with other clients still climbing laboriously behind. Boukreev establishes rope on the Hillary Step, necessitating more waiting. Krakauer, nervous about time and his own dwindling oxygen, asks to continue first as soon as the rope is fixed. Delirious and dazed, he reaches the summit and takes in the incredible view. His celebratory feelings are dampened by awareness that he must make it down safely; his oxygen is almost finished—“the summit was really only the halfway point” (189).

Krakauer, aware of the time, abandons his plan to photograph himself with memorabilia from his wife and Outside magazine. Instead, he takes four quick photos of Andy and Boukreev before beginning his descent. Krakauer sees “wispy” clouds filling the valley to the south; these are actually the tops of thunderheads. Krakauer helps Andy clear a frozen chunk from his ice mask and asks Andy to turn off his oxygen while he waits for a crowd of people to ascend the Hillary Step. Andy mistakenly turns the oxygen flow up, accelerating the loss of Krakauer’s supply. On his way past Krakauer, Rob laments not being able to get more clients to the summit. Krakauer must wait an hour for the crowd of people from Rob’s expedition, Fischer’s expedition, and the Taiwanese group to clear the step. He feels increasingly hypoxic.

Krakauer finally begins to descend the step. Feeling disoriented, he calls down to Harris, who is sorting oxygen bottles on the South Summit, to bring him oxygen. Harris calls back that the bottles are all empty, filling Krakauer with dread. Fortunately, Groom passes at that moment and graciously gives Krakauer his own oxygen. Groom and Krakauer reach the South Summit and examine the oxygen bottles and quickly find that there are six full bottles, but Andy cannot be convinced and continues to insist that the bottles are empty. Krakauer continues to descend, entering dense clouds with lightly falling snow; he notes that the visibility worsens significantly. Groom helps Namba down the Southeast ridge. Krakauer receives permission to continue alone down the mountain and is shocked to encounter Weathers, who explains that his eyesight deteriorated earlier in the day and that he would wait for Hall or Groom to short-rope him down.

Krakauer continues down the balcony of the Southeast ridge. He hears thunder crash and lightning lights up the sky above. The visibility decreases further as the wind picks up, creating a blizzard. Krakauer struggles to navigate a difficult section of the route but eventually reaches the incline of glassy ice 200 feet above Camp Four. His oxygen runs out. Feeling utterly exhausted and hypoxic, he sits above the tents for around 45 minutes, marshaling energy to navigate the final stretch. While there, an individual, who Krakauer believes to be Andy Harris, arrives, tumbles down the steep face, and proceeds toward the tents. Krakauer eventually navigates the steep slope in his crampons and reaches his tent, collapsing into an exhausted sleep.

Beidleman waits on the summit for the rest of the Mountain Madness group. At 2:00pm—the previously stated turnaround time—he begins to grow concerned. He is aware of his position as third guide—behind Fischer and Boukreev—and doesn’t want to overstep. Fischer is responsible for deciding whether clients be turned around, but there is no sign of him anywhere. With no radio, there is no way for Beidleman to check in with Fischer. Finally, the lagging climbers from both groups arrive, apart from Hansen and Fischer, who are thought to be just below the summit. Beidleman starts down with the clients; he focuses his efforts on assisting Pittman down, who looks haggard and exhausted. At one stage, Charlotte Fox injects a prostrate and nonsensical Pittman with a dose of dexamathasone—the Mountain Madness team’s last resort in the case of severe altitude-induced delirium. Fortunately, Pittman revives; Pittman, Beidleman, Fox, Gamelgaard, and Madsen continue their descent. Below them, Groom assists Namba and Martin Adams. Groom is shocked to find Weathers in the snow and begins short-roping him down toward the tents.

Fischer does not reveal to his teammates that he is suffering from severe gastric pain caused by a cyst on his liver; this may have been affecting him during the climb. Krakauer sees Fischer and registers that he looks exhausted but doesn’t consider that Fischer may be in trouble. Similarly, Beidleman notices Fischer’s seemingly exhausted state as he passes with Pittman but assumes that he is fine.

The members and guides of Mountain Madness and those from Rob’s Adventure Consultants form a single group consisting of Beidleman, Pittman, Fox, Gamelgaard, Schoening, Madsen, Groom, and Namba on the South Col, only about 200 feet from the tents. They are joined by the Sherpas Tashi Tshering and Ngawang Dorje. Stuart Hutchison—who turned back before the summit earlier in the day—tries to bang pots and shine lights to attract the lost expeditions to Camp Four, but the “ballistically strong” wind soon drives him back to his tent. The storm increases in intensity and the group becomes disorientated, struggling to find the camp and stumbling around in the intense blizzard. They hunker down beside a small rock. High above this group are Andy Harris, Rob Hall, Doug Hansen, Scott Fischer, and Lopsang Jangbu.

When the storm appears to die down for a moment, Beidleman assembles those able to walk: Schoening, Gammelgaard, Groom, and the two Sherpas (Madsen is also still able to move but opts to stay with his girlfriend Charlotte Fox and the other incapacitated individuals). The group leave to find Camp Four. They finally reach it and Boukreev, who is in his tent at Camp Four, is sent to retrieve the others. Krakauer draws critical attention to Boukreev’s choice to leave the summit so much earlier in the day—ahead of any of the Mountain Madness clients.

Stuart Hutchison tries to rouse the Sherpas from Hall’s team to help with his rescue, but those who reached the summit are too exhausted, and Chuldum and Arita—Sherpas left off the summit party in case of emergency—come down with carbon monoxide poisoning and can’t help.

Boukreev determinedly searches the South Col for hours, sick with worry, and eventually finds the rapidly deteriorating group. Namba appears to be dead; Pittman, Fox, and Weathers are unable to walk. Boukreev helps Fox back to Camp Four, then returns for Sandy. Madsen, able to support himself, follows Boukreev and Sandy. Weathers and Namba are assumed to be dead or almost dead and are left.