Seven Summits (33 page)

“As soon as I get back to camp 2 and put another group of Sherpas together. Good luck on your attempt. We'll probably cross on the ropes.”

Dick then left Frank and sped down the fixed ropes, arriving in camp 2 feeling frustrated, but strong and confident he would make it on a second try—and ever so thankful Hixson had sided with the Sherpas on stopping their summit effort after what had transpired earlier that morning.

That evening in the mess tent, over hot tea and cookies, Dick told us about his experiences high on the mountain, and as we listened I watched his bright eyes and animated hands and it occurred to me that in my experiences on several mountain climbing trips to the Himalaya I had never seen anyone come down who, after having been above the 8,000-meter mark, looked as spunky as Dick Bass. And I’d certainly never seen anybody who was fifty-three years old and was absolutely convinced that on the second time he would waltz right to the summit.

Dick finished his story and then said, “Now I’ve got to go canvass these Sherpas and see who's willing to go back up.”

“I don't know where you find the energy to go up twice,” one of the other climbers said.

“It's not so hard now that I know what's up there,” Dick said. “And besides, I’m excited that it'll mean more to me this way.” Dick took another sip of tea, and with his trademark grin added, “Because what we gain too easily, we esteem too lightly.”

The next morning Frank Wells adjusted his oxygen regulator to two liters a minute, strapped on his face mask, and left camp 3 to start the long upward traverse across the Lhotse Face. Other than his oxygen bottle he was carrying no weight—the Sherpas ahead of him had the equipment—but he was still moving slowly, feeling the enervation of high altitude. It took two hours to gain a point where the rope turned upward in a more direct line to the South Col. Looking up, Frank could see the Sherpas a hundred yards above, moving one slow step at a time. He looked at his oxygen tank's dial; the bottle was three-quarters full.

He took the regulator knob and turned it to three liters a minute.

What a difference. With the extra liter a minute he felt like his afterburner had kicked in. He caught the Sherpas and passed them. The fixed rope continued upward in a direct line paralleling the Geneva Spur, which lay to Frank's left, obscuring his view of the summit pyramid of Everest. Then the rope angled across the Spur. Frank was surprised at how strong he felt as the slope steepened. As he approached the crest he glanced up. The view caught him by surprise; he wasn't expecting it to look so close. But there was the giant pyramid of snow-laced rock, the plume cloud boiling in a long banner off to leeward. The summit. If only tomorrow he could find the strength he now felt, then maybe, just maybe … He told himself he'd better stop daydreaming, and finish the job at hand.

In fifteen minutes he reached the Col. He looked at his watch: four hours and fifteen minutes from camp 3. He thought, Maybe I really do have a chance of making the top.

The thought thrilled him, put him in a buoyant mood. Just to see what would happen, he adjusted his regulator to its highest setting —eight liters a minute—and took a walk around the flat Col. For a few minutes he didn't notice anything until he realized he was speeding effortlessly from one side of the saddle to the other. Just like taking a walk around the block in Beverly Hills, he thought.

But at the same time what an antipodal contrast to Beverly Hills. And how delightfully improbable, Frank thought, that a movie executive in his fifties who only two years before had hardly done anything beyond fantasizing about mountain climbing was now by himself waltzing around at the 8,000-meter mark of Mount Everest.

Frank was ecstatic: reaching the South Col had been a goal in itself, a dream and fantasy that only a few months before had seemed as elusive as the summit.

Even if I don't get any higher, he told himself, this feels pretty good.

With a light gait he walked back to the tents, and took his pack off. Even without the oxygen he was surprised how strong he felt. The Sherpas still hadn't arrived, so he crawled into the tent feeling so good he thought he might even try, to figure out how to start one of the stoves and make himself some hot chocolate. Then he decided that might be going too far; he would wait for the Sherpas.

They arrived about ten minutes later. With the stoves going, and a hot brew in him, he lay back to relax. A moment later the first breath of wind caused the tent to give a slight flutter. Then it was quiet, but soon the fabric walls again ruffled, only this time they didn't stop. Ten minutes later there was a solid fifteen-mile-an-hour breeze, and by nightfall it had increased to what Frank guessed was hurricane force.

“Are the tents holding up?” Ershler asked over the radio.

“So far,” Frank yelled, raising his voice above the staccato snapping of the tent fabric.

“What's it like outside?” Ershler asked. Frank could tell Ershler was quizzing him to determine just how strong the wind was.

“I can't stand up. Have to crawl to get to the next tent.”

“What do the Sherpas think?”

“That we can't go anywhere. Have to stay here.”

The next day conditions were even worse. The tents still held, but it was clear to Ershler and everyone else there could be no summit bid until the wind abated. Frank spent the time in his sleeping bag, happy he had decided on the extra weight of the paperback
King Rat.
He was also, in a way, happy to have an excuse to postpone the summit attempt. While half of him still daydreamed about reaching the top now that he was this close, the other half realized this last section would nevertheless be the most physically demanding undertaking of his life. It was a funny thing that he couldn't seem to overcome, this sort of dual pull between giving it his all versus giving in, and he realized he would actually be relieved to have an excuse to go down, as long as it was for some reason beyond his control, as long as he could tell himself later he really had stuck with it as long as possible.

While Frank was pinned at the South Col, Ed Hixson spent one day in camp 2, sleeping on oxygen, and then descended on his own power to base camp. He appeared to be getting better although he complained of being oppressively tired. The next day he slept, getting up only to walk to the mess tent for meals. He was having trouble keeping his balance but attributed it to fatigue and thought another night's sleep would help. When he awoke, though, and sat up in his sleeping bag, he was so dizzy it made him nauseous. He couldn't hold food or water, and by noon was too weak to crawl. He could still think clearly enough to deduce that his stroke was moving into his cerebellum, affecting his motor control. He knew the only antidote was to get immediately to lower altitude.

But how? He couldn't walk. If he had himself tied to the back of a yak the jostling might make things worse. There was no one in camp with the strength to carry a litter that far. The only solution might be the Nepal air force, which had a helicopter capable of landing at 18,000 feet. A few minutes later when Gerhard Lenser came to Hixson's tent to check on him, Hixson was so weak all he could muster was a few words in a strained voice: “Radio Katmandu for helicopter. Must get out or I won't make it.”

Luanne Wells and Marian Bass had come to Katmandu the week before expecting to join their husbands as they came off the mountain and together take a few extra days on the way home and enjoy themselves in Hong Kong. Now they learned that Dick had made one attempt and was planning another, and that Frank had been pinned by high winds for three days at 26,200 feet waiting his chance. Worse, they heard that nearly all the other team members (everyone except Ershler and Neptune) had quit the mountain and were heading down.

Nielson and Jamieson had been the first out. After the ABC honchos had received the microwaved videotape of Nielson making the summit, they fed it via the Katmandu earth station to New York, where it was on
Good Morning America
about four hours after the group left the summit. Then the network editors began working furiously to edit the show and have the one-hour special ready for broadcast in less than a week, even while the subsequent teams were on the mountain making their attempts. Meanwhile, though, since the first summit team had returned to base camp the ABC producer John Wilcox had the idea to send a helicopter to base camp to fetch Nielson and bring him to Katmandu where Bob Beattie would then interview him live.

The chopper had room for one extra person and since Jamieson had minor frostbite he got the nod to join Nielson. With those two gone, Roach decided he was going to leave, and after the second summit team got off the mountain States decided he too would go home.

To Luanne and Marian it looked like rats jumping a sinking ship. Without the full team it seemed to them the expedition should be called off and that Frank and Dick should come down. Even the ABC crew was packing up. The associate producer who had each day monitored the radio for calls from base camp, Mary Jo Kinser, had taken a day off to go sightseeing, but had told Luanne and Marian they were welcome to come to the Sheraton where all the television gear was housed and monitor the radio at call times in case there was any news. She showed Luanne how to work the radio.

It was Saturday morning when Luanne and Marian got the key from the desk and went up to the now deserted ABC room to see if anything was coming in on the 9:00
A.M.
call. They heard the radio crackling as they worked the door to get it open and ran to the transmitter. It was the pidgin voice of the Nepalese who monitored the radio link at the Everest View Hotel.

“Hello Katmandu, this is Everest View. Does anyone monitor? Repeat, does anyone monitor? This is an emergency.”

“Oh, my God,” Luanne said, unable to speak what she feared.

“Hello. This is Katmandu. What is wrong?”

“We have a report from base camp that Dr. Ed Hixson is gravely ill. He must have a helicopter to evacuate him immediately or he will die.”

“Yes, yes. We understand. We will get a helicopter as soon as possible.”

The radio operator at Everest View said he would stand by.

Luanne looked at Marian. “Where are we going to get a helicopter?” she said.

“Look here at this piece of paper,” Marian said, indicating a list of numbers next to the radio. One said “helicopter pilot.” They went down to the lobby and phoned the number. It was a colonel in the Nepal air force who was their chief chopper pilot.

“Yes, we can fly. But first you must pay.”

“What do you mean?”

“We only fly if the helicopter time is paid in advance. The round trip to base camp costs nineteen hundred dollars U.S.”

“We'll be right over and write you a check.”

“I am sorry. It must be cash.”

The clerk at the hotel lobby wouldn't cash a personal check, and as it was Saturday the banks were closed. Then they saw Mary Jo, the ABC person, coming in from her sightseeing trip. She was also the production purser, and quickly cashed Luanne's check.

With the cash in hand Luanne, Marian, and Mary Jo caught a cab and raced to the airport, where the colonel took the money but told them he couldn't fly as it was Saturday and the co-pilot was away from his house and couldn't be found.

“Our Panasonic camera engineer was a chopper pilot in Vietnam,” Mary Jo said. “Let's get him.”

They located the engineer, Alan Wechsler, and after quizzing him the colonel agreed to go. “Except that the weather is bad at base camp. I can't go until things improve.”

The Everest View Hotel radio operator relayed a report from base camp that the area was partially covered by broken clouds. Conditions were improving, but Hixson was rapidly worsening and might die before the day was out. In Katmandu the women waited nervously by the radio. The next report said the bad weather was holding. An hour passed, then two. Finally the report said there was a temporary hole in the clouds at base camp; they immediately called the colonel at the airport.

“Okay, we'll try it,” the colonel said.

They flew the chopper through the building clouds, poking from one hole to the next. They followed the Khumbu Glacier, and the colonel kept an alert hand on the stick as he felt the lifting power of the rotors wane—the thin air at 18,000 feet is considered about the limit for a helicopter of this type to land and take off.

When they reached base camp the colonel cautiously eased one skid onto a rock, balancing the ship while Wechsler delicately eased off and ran over to help Hixson. Lenser came up and threw Hixson's pack in the chopper, but the pilot angrily motioned him to throw it back off—he wanted minimum weight for takeoff, and that meant only Hixson.

Unable to walk on his own, Hixson was muscled by Wechsler into the chopper, and the colonel carefully lifted the skid off the rock. The helicopter was on the edge of its ability. When he had a few feet clearance he eased the ship forward, and was safely airborne.

Two hours later Hixson was in the Katmandu hospital. Luanne and Marian decided it made sense to wait and visit him in the morning after he had rested. Exhausted themselves, they went to the Sheraton bar to have a drink, worried sick about their husbands.

The next morning she and Marian went to the hospital to find Hixson. They walked the labyrinthine hallways on floors that were by western standards filthy. Finally they found his room. He was lying on his back, staring at the ceiling.

“Excuse me. Are you Dr. Hixson?”

They watched in horror as he tried to sit up. He was paralyzed on one side, so half of him hung limply as the other half struggled to overcome the deadweight. He looked at them, then slowly raised his hand and covered one eye; he was seeing double and that was the only way he could focus.

With slurred speech he said, “Am I glad to see you guys.” Then he collapsed back in bed.

Luanne stared at him, thanking God he was at least alive, but at the same time wondering that if in seeing Hixson in this condition she was also seeing her husband a week from now. That is, if she ever saw her husband alive again.