Trek & Mountain Magazine Covering Our Everest Flash
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EVEREST As a new style of rapid ascent or ‘flash’ expedition that shortens the time needed to summit Everest gains popularity, one of its chief proponents Lukas Furtenbach explains how it compromises neither safety or ethics… WORDS & PICTURES: LUKAS FURTENBACH Summiting Everest just three weeks after leaving home 32 MARCH/APRIL 2019 MARCH/APRIL 2019 33 EVEREST High up on Everest’s north-east ridge nake oil!” – “It will never work for Sherpas and mountain guides to climb with clients!” – “A highly dubious and supplemental oxygen. I believe that limiting dangerous undertaking!” – the amount of oxygen provided to three S“Complete bloody hogwash!” These were cylinders for example, or a certain flow rate, just some of the many comments made is actually tantamount to negligence, in about my company’s (Furtenbach much the same way as if a mountain guide Adventures) 2018 Flash Everest expedition were to say to his or her clients: “I’ll catch by luminaries of the mountain world and you on the rope the first two times you fall some of the pioneers of high altitude but if you fall again, you’ll have to climb on expedition climbing (a Google search will without a rope and take responsibility for reveal more about who said what). And yourselves”. Whether someone has climbed that was before the expedition had even Everest using just one bottle of oxygen at a begun! In this article I will explain flow rate of 2 litres/minute or five bottles of exactly how we run our Everest Flash oxygen at a flow rate of 6 litres/minute is expeditions, and why I believe they are wholly irrelevant to both the official actually safer than standard, longer statistics or questions of moral or ethical Everest expeditions and debunk the style. The ascent was made using argument that they go against the ethics supplemental oxygen and will be considered of mountaineering. and recorded as such. There is no documentation to determine HISTORY LESSON how many clients have died on Everest due But let’s start by going back 40 years. When to insufficient or inadequate oxygen Peter Habeler and Reinhold Messner, as supplies. But every single one of them could members of the 1978 Austrian Alpine have been avoided. They were reliant on Association Everest expedition under their expedition operator, the Sherpas or Wolfgang Nairz, announced they would their mountain guide. And that is the reason attempt an ascent without supplemental they died. oxygen, they were told they would suffer permanent brain damage. Pretty much FAST FORWARD... everyone who was anyone in the climbing It’s the end of April 2018. The Everest scene at the time declared they were on a season is in full swing. Our guests on the suicide mission. And this, despite the fact Classic Everest Expedition have been in that Edward Norton had already made it to Tibet for almost one month now and have 8,573m on the North Face of Everest back just completed their first acclimatisation in 1924, without oxygen. rotation on the mountain. The guests on my Yet Messner and Habeler went on to Everest Flash Expedition and I are still at make mountaineering history. Ascending home. It feels strange. In some ways, like the regular route on the South side of the being back at school and knowing you are mountain, they climbed their way to the going to arrive late, but there’s nothing you summit along a route that had been can do about it. equipped by 22 Sherpas with aluminium Everest Flash means climbing Mount ladders and thousands of metres of fixed Everest in an outrageous four weeks for a line, as well as five established high camps progressive €95.000. Or is it the other way complete with stashes of oxygen cylinders. around? “Everest Classic” is a little more There was nothing new about the feat, conservatively-priced at €55,000 for an eight- insofar as by 1978 countless expeditions had week expedition experience. For our Flash already successfully climbed that same route. Expedition, team members take part in a What was really groundbreaking, was the special eight-week acclimatisation fact that Messner and Habeler did not use programme back at home involving hypoxic any of the oxygen that had been deposited tents and active hypoxic training (see by the Sherpas on the mountain. And by boxout on page 43). We have spent the last doing so, they established a very exclusive 15 years adapting the equipment we use to club. By 2017, Mount Everest had been our specific requirements and fine-tuning climbed a total of 8,306 times (including the programme. multiple ascents by the same person), of At the end of the eight weeks, each which 208 ascents were without oxygen, and participant will have spent a fixed number only 151 of these without the help of of hours at different altitudes and reached a Sherpas. By the end of 2017, the number of maximum sleeping altitude of over 7,100m. people who died on Everest stood at 288. Of In this way, we are able to simulate two full this number, 168 did not use any rotations on the mountain. In theory, at this supplemental oxygen. stage, they are ready to travel to Everest and These figures illustrate two things: that set off straight away. climbing Mount Everest without So that’s exactly what we did. We left supplemental oxygen is seldom successful, Europe on May 1st, spent two days in and that it carries a high risk. For Kathmandu (1,350m) waiting for our visas commercial Everest operators it is practically and by May 6th were at Everest Base Camp a moral obligation to enable their guests, on the Chinese North side, at 5,200m. 34 MARCH/APRIL 2019 MARCH/APRIL 2019 35 Looking down upper part of the Second Step Having been exposed to altitude upon and yes, it works just as well as arrival in Tibet (Lhasa is 3600m above acclimatisation on the mountain at actual sea level), on the seventh day we then set altitude, if not better. And no, the Flash off on our safety rotation and reached the “To make it clear once and Expedition’s success cannot be attributed to North Col at 7000m without any difficulties for all – acclimatisation using ridiculous amounts of oxygen. But (and without supplemental oxygen). Had more on that later. our acclimatisation programme back at using a hypoxic tent back The Everest Flash programme and the home not been effective, any altitude €95,000 do in fact equate to a high level of complications would have emerged by this in your home country does support and safety on the mountain. We stage at the very latest. So, we descended to work and yes, it works just use a ratio of two Sherpas per client, offer Base Camp and waited for a suitable an unlimited supply of oxygen and have weather window, during which time all the as well as acclimatisation had our own regulators built that produce clients on the Classic Team under the a flow rate of 8 litres per minute. In guidance of Rupert Hauer, successfully on the mountain at actual addition, we carry spares of everything – reached the summit on May 16th. altitude, if not better.” masks, regulators and bottles – for each We were lucky with the weather and were client, all the way up to the summit and able to set off on schedule. All of the clients back. The average summit day flow rate in the Flash Team (once again under the any cracked lips. Nothing. Their exposure for Western operators on Everest stands guidance of Rupert Hauer) summitted on time was too short for the mountain and at 4-6 litres per minute (see boxout, May 21st, just 17 days after leaving the inhospitable environment to make its page 44). Kathmandu or 21 days after saying goodbye mark on them. Initial reactions to our Flash Expedition to their loved ones back at home. They came in fast and were dreadfully descended to ABC (Advanced Base Camp) LET’S TALK ABOUT OXYGEN misinformed. Supposedly we had allowed at 6400m the very same day. One day later, So, what now? In anticipation of further the team, which included pretty much everyone was back at Base Camp, healthy scepticism, and to make it clear once and for anyone who asked regardless of experience, and without any injuries or wounds, all, even for those who still don’t want to to be dragged up the mountain, each person looking more like they had just come from believe it: yes, acclimatisation using a short-roped to two Sherpas, and so pumped the office than from a summit push on hypoxic tent back in your home country up with oxygen that they experienced an Mount Everest. No sunburnt faces, not even does work (it is also scientifically proven) oxygen ‘high’ on the summit and danced 36 MARCH/APRIL 2019 EVEREST Camp 2 with a view to the North Col and Changste “We expect a great deal from our participants, but in all of our Everest expeditions there has only been one person with previous experience of an 8000m peak. And yet there has only been one client who didn’t make it to the summit.” a victory dance like Neymar after scoring a goal. Well, that would have been a simple interpretation for the critics and sceptics – were it the case. But it wasn’t. The number of people we refuse on our Everest Expeditions is far greater than the number we accept. Our eligibility criteria are very strict and also differ from other operators.