by Ben Fogle
‘The Balcony is just ahead,’ hollered Kenton as we overtook the final two Chinese climbers.
I collapsed onto all fours as we reached the tiny flat area, the only small respite on the summit ridge. I was gasping for air, even with my mask and oxygen, I was struggling to breathe. I fumbled for the supply valve and turned it up to the highest volume. It didn’t help. I was like a goldfish, except each time I opened my mouth to breathe, it felt like nothing was going in.
I began to panic as I struggled for air. By now, the rest of the Chinese team were all arriving onto the Balcony. Panic turned to fear that they would pass us once again and we would lose all the ground that had taken us five hours to reclaim.
I sat on my rucksack and tried to inhale through my nose. Long, slow inhalations, followed by a long exhalation from my mouth. I thought back to the time I had spent in Thailand with Père Julian, the French-Canadian monk who had taught me breath control and meditation. I envisaged his little wooden meditation platform in the Thai jungle. I could see myself sitting there cross-legged, eyes closed, the sound of birdlife echoing through the jungle beyond as he taught me how to control my breathing.
‘Smile and breathe in powerfully through your nose for 20 seconds,’ he had instructed me. ‘Now hold the breath and then exhale for 30 seconds.’
It’s amazing the power of the mind. In that moment, I left the Balcony and returned to Thailand. I could feel my heart slowing, and gradually I regained control of my breathing. It was scary how quickly and how easily I had lost control in the first place.
‘The Balcony. I’m on the famous Balcony,’ I thought to myself, as finally my senses returned.
By now, dozens of climbers had arrived on this narrow patch of snow. Not prepared to be overtaken by the same climbers we had spent more than five hours trying to overtake, we started almost immediately on the next stage of our ascent.
I took the lead at the head of the group as I clipped onto the line and headed into the darkness. The route led me along a sharp pinnacle of snow with steep drops on either side. In the gloom, it was difficult to tell how far they fell.
Carefully, I placed one foot in front of the other as I navigated the thin ledge. I could already see the headlights of the team behind us, assembling on the line. It felt like we had control of the situation again. The summit was in our grasp. I had plenty of oxygen on a low delivery. I was feeling confident and we had a clear mountain ahead of us; what’s more, the sky was still clear, with the promise of good weather ahead.
My mind began to drift to the summit and the feeling of relief.
It was too soon.
Psssttttt …
There was a loud, high-pitched hissing coming from behind me. The sudden break from the silence made me jump from my daydreams. My heart started to race as I turned to see where the noise was coming from. It was deafeningly loud, but I couldn’t make out its source. Each time I turned, the noise seemed to stay with me.
In my oxygen-starved brain, it was difficult to work out what was happening. Suddenly, a moment of realisation. It was coming from me. It was coming from my bag. It was my oxygen. I stopped as the others caught up. I slipped the rucksack off my shoulders and placed it on the ground. Had Kenton forgotten to screw the regulator onto the bottle properly? Had I knocked the top of the bottle, loosening the valve?
I couldn’t compute what had gone wrong. Why was my bottle spewing my precious, life-saving, beautiful oxygen into the thin air? We were well into the death zone at about 8,500 metres and my lifeline was disappearing before me. I pulled the mask from my face as the last wisps of oxygen disappeared into the chill mountain air.
‘Breathe deep,’ I repeated to myself, ‘breathe slowly.’
I could feel panic rising from inside, but once again I tried to withdraw internally back to that little platform in Thailand.
‘It’s the regulator that’s blown,’ explained Kenton as he unscrewed the tether from the bottle. Somehow the D-ring that connects the regulator to the bottle had blown, allowing the contents of my bottle to leak out.
It was the worst news possible. If it had been one of the bottles themselves that had leaked, then I could simply have used another one. But it wasn’t. It was the regulator that connects the mask to the bottle and it had blown irreparably. We didn’t carry spares. I couldn’t see how I was going to get out of this one. Without a spare regulator, it would be difficult to go anywhere.
There is a misconception that climbing Everest without oxygen is a common thing to do. It is not. Climbing Everest without ‘O’s’ is a feat completed by the few. Indeed, of the 4,000 people to have climbed to the summit, fewer than 200 have done so without oxygen. That’s only five per cent.
Of course, those 200 climbers who have successfully ascended without oxygen have done so with either years of practice or an extraordinary metabolism. After days of dependency on oxygen, to suddenly take it away would be a little like free-diving without oxygen tanks to twice the usual depth.
Going slowly, I estimated I could probably descend back to Camp 4 where we would be able to radio for help from below to bring a spare up from Base Camp, but even this seemed risky.
Supplementary oxygen ensures the blood remains warm and that it circulates in the body keeping all extremities like fingers, toes and nose warm in the extreme cold. Many of the cases of frostbite that have afflicted so many climbers over the years are the result of being caught in storms and their oxygen running out. The combination of long exposure to the cold and the lack of oxygen, invariably leads to frostbite injury.
The second symptom of lack of oxygen is a confused state of mind and disorientation. Even with supplementary oxygen, I was struggling to stay focused and in control. I didn’t have too long to worry. Kenton turned to Ming Dorjee Sherpa. ‘Will you give your bottle and regulator to Ben and go back to Camp 4?’
It was a big ask and naturally Ming Dorjee wasn’t sure. For many of the sherpas, the summit day is payday. They can earn more in a single summit from the ‘summit bonus’ than most Nepalese earn in a year. Many sherpas will spend years working up to the summit. It is the sum of their ambition. What’s more, it’s an investment in their future employment prospects. Sherpas who have summited before are usually more coveted. The more summits the more work; it’s a profession after all.
To ask Ming Dorjee to give up his summit for me was a massive thing to request of him. Effectively, he would be sacrificing his own success for mine.
‘I’ll still pay you the summit bonus,’ I implored.
He looked at me and then at Kenton. ‘Okay,’ he nodded.
It was a selfless act of heroism. I felt quite emotional as he handed me his mask and bottle.
Ming Dorjee began the slow, painful journey without oxygen or a mask back to Camp 4. Meanwhile, we were once again heading up the mountain.
It was still pitch black as we continued our ascent. By now, the Chinese team were once again hot on our heels, closing in on us as we marched onwards.
The very first, faint outline of light had appeared on the horizon. It painted the line between the mountains and the sky with a dull orange hue. At first it was almost imperceptible, but as the morning marched forwards it turned to violet and then purple.
Soon I could see a perfect outline of the peaks in the distance, their contours silhouetted vividly against the dawn colours. It was just after 4 am and there was enough light to climb without a headtorch. We reached a vertiginous section of ice and rock that soared high above. For the first time since leaving Camp 4, I could see the scale of our exposure on the mountain.
I looked up and the little voice of self-doubt returned as I clipped onto another rope that soared high into the thin air.
‘Look Up,’ I kept repeating to myself, ‘don’t look down.’
It took all I could to control my fear as my crampons dug into the hard ice. Occasionally, I didn’t ‘toe’ the crampons hard enough and one boot would slip. It was terrifying.
One boot
in front of the other. Slowly, I made a little headway up the icy slope until we reached a small wall of rock. Just as I was about to haul myself over it, I heard another loud bang.
Psssstttttt …
My heart sank as I turned to see where it was coming from. I felt sure it must be me again. How could this be happening? The noise sounded a little more distant than last time. I grabbed my regulator and looked at the gauge. It appeared normal. Where was the noise coming from? Looking behind me, I saw that Mark was struggling. He had taken his pack off. It was Mark’s bottle. The D-ring had blown and his precious oxygen was gone.
What the hell was happening? Kenton had reassured us that in 12 summits he had never experienced equipment failure with the oxygen bottles or the regulators, and now here we were at 8,700 metres dealing with our second explosion. My heart raced as panic began to bubble. What if my bottle also goes? And Kenton’s and Ang Thindu’s?
Once again, I was losing the battle of mind over mountain. We were on one of the most exposed slopes on the climb, a sheer icy cliff with drops of thousands of metres below us. For the first time since crossing one of the ice ladders in the Khumbu Icefall, I felt a surge of vertigo envelop my body. I froze. I daren’t look down.
This time it was Ang Thindu who came to the rescue. Fearful that I would be overwhelmed by vertigo, I decided that the only way was up. If I stayed while the team swapped bottles and equipment, I was fearful that I would be overcome by my fear of heights.
‘Carry on and we’ll catch you up,’ hollered Kenton.
Slowly and meticulously, I carried on alone. Higher and higher I climbed until soon the team were out of sight.
I found myself perched alone on an exposed shoulder of the mountain. The sun had just broken over the horizon, casting a giant shadow of Everest onto the peaks beyond. It was without doubt the finest, the most glorious, the most otherworldly sunrise I have ever witnessed.
I was alone. Marooned high on the mountain.
Before long Kenton and Mark rejoined me and we continued towards the summit.
I could make out a large flat surface above me, shimmering in the early morning glow of light. The summit. It must be the summit.
How I had longed for this moment.
Head down, I climbed as hard as I could to reach that seemingly impossible place. That tiny point of snow and ice that has claimed so many lives.
Just a few more paces and I was on the roof …
Hang on. As I looked ahead of me, I could see that the snowy slope continued along a jagged ridge.
It was a false peak. Otherwise known as the south summit.
The north summit, the real peak, was on the other side of the jagged, crown-like ridge.
‘How long do you think it will take us?’ I asked Kenton against my better judgement. I had always avoided the ‘How long until …’ question. The answer was always bad. Ever since I was a child, I have hated the answer. I prefer the unknown.
‘About an hour and a half.’
I would have preferred the unknown.
About an hour and a half. But I was done. I had no gas left in the tank. I had peaked too early. It looked impossible and the inner voice of doubt returned.
We rested next to a wall of rock. This was where Rob Hall made his last phone call before perishing in the 1996 tragedy.
After some Haribo and some Maltesers, we soldiered on along the crest of the ridge.
‘Whoa Ben, not so close to the edge,’ warned Kenton. ‘It’s an overhang.’
It soon became apparent just how vulnerable we were as we climbed up and down the jagged icy ridge that led towards the summit. The north summit. The true summit that I could now see clearly in the distance.
But first we had to cross the infamous Hillary Step.
Much has been made about the Hillary Step since the earthquake of 2015. There had been plenty of reports that part of the rock had crumbled away leaving more of a ramp than a step. But without a proper geological survey, there is still some debate about how much it has changed.
Having nothing to compare it with, I had to rely on Kenton to explain that the upper part had indeed crumbled away, leaving a series of steep steps. What had once been a dangerous bottleneck was now just dangerous.
The summit suddenly looked like it was in my grasp again.
I took a large step up.
Pssssttttt …
That dreadful sound will remain with me until the day I die, which quite frankly felt like it was now.
That hideous, high-pitched squeal and squeak as my lifeline of oxygen fizzed and evaporated from the bottle – my second regulator had blown. My oxygen had disappeared into the thin air. I was at 8,800 metres and I was out of my depth. Nothing had prepared me for this. Nothing. I had nothing to draw on. Helpless. Hopeless. Senseless.
I began to panic. I lost my breath. I was having a panic attack. In the thin air, I couldn’t think straight. Kenton and Mark were there. Reassuring. Kenton was quick. He ripped his own mask from his face and placed it over my mouth.
What about Kenton? What would he do now? Could he descend from here without oxygen? Was he capable? Could we go on without him? So many questions, but all of them drowned out by the intoxication of being just 50 metres from the summit.
‘You go on,’ insisted Kenton. ‘I’ll catch you up.’
He explained that his best hopes of a spare bottle would be on the summit where there would be more climbers from both sides of the mountain. I looked at Kenton, turned towards the summit and started climbing. Further up, I looked back at Kenton to see him on his hands and knees.
‘What have I done?’
Marina – Breaking radio silence
Finally, there was some news. A text.
‘It looks like we’ll be leaving on Thursday morning, early. I’ll call you on Wednesday.’
My anxiety was beginning to build. I feared not only that he wouldn’t be safe, but also that he might have to face failure and return to the UK, defeated.
Wednesday came and went with no call from Ben. I consoled myself that no news was good news. As used as we are to being in constant communication, you were at nature’s mercy at the foot of Everest. Sometimes the internet worked and you had phone signal, sometimes it didn’t, and there wasn’t anything anyone could do about it.
On Friday morning, the familiar sat-phone number flashed up on my screen. It was Ben calling from Camp 2. He told me that there had been a huge electrical storm and the communications at Base Camp had been completely offline. He maintained that he was feeling good, strong and excited about their summit attempt, but I could hear the exhaustion in his voice. As we talked he rasped, and between our breathless exchanges, his hacking cough reminded me that life at that altitude is not sustainable to human existence.
They had identified a weather window on Monday morning. ‘I can’t promise I’ll call you from the top,’ he warned. I got that, but still, I was going to make damn sure that my phone was right beside me through the night.
CNN, who were filming the expedition, wanted me to record any phone call I might have with my husband from the top. Neil, who was leading the production, came to set up a small GoPro and show me how to use it. I was distracted, this seemed presumptuous and I didn’t want to spend too long thinking how to record a phone call which I wasn’t sure I was ever going to receive. They asked me to take the cameras wherever I went, something I ignored resolutely.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Summit
I could barely lift one foot in front of the other. I was reduced to dragging my following foot to save energy. Neil Armstrong walking on the moon looked like Usain Bolt compared to my speed. I would walk a couple of paces and then have to stop to get my breath back. I have never in my life felt so depleted of energy or restricted of ability. It was like I had been wrapped in chains.
I could see the north summit up ahead. I could make out the brightly coloured suits of half a dozen climbers. Where had they come from? I knew we were the first cl
imbers to reach the summit. We had passed everyone else and I was pretty sure there had been no one ahead of us. In my exhaustion, I had failed to remember that half the summiteers had come up from the north side. These climbers ahead of me had come from the China side.
The summit was within touching distance and yet it never seemed to get closer as I edged along the narrow crest of mountain towards the highest point on earth. Mark was now a short distance ahead of me. I looked around and there was no sign of Kenton, nor any other climbers.
I shuffled and gasped and wheezed and suffered up to that last tiny stretch of hill until finally I reached the prayer flags that marked the top of the world at 8,848 metres.
This was it. From this little mound, it was impossible to go any higher unless you were in a flying machine.
I was on the roof of the world.
Strangely, there was no fist-pumping euphoria. There were no hollers of success or tears of emotion. In fact, I felt slightly emotionless. It was hyper-real. Even now. It remains one of the most vivid experiences of my life. It was like every sense had been turned to maximum level, and yet, despite the intenseness of the moment, I felt numb. There was nothing. No relief. No happiness. No elation. Nothing.
I sat there, on that little mound of snow and ice, and I stared out at the landscape beyond. The sky was so blue it looked black. I felt closer to space than I did to anywhere recognisable. Up here, I could make out the curvature of the earth. Next time you are in a commercial airliner cruising at altitude, imagine climbing out of the window and sitting on the wing. This was my view. The mountains below stretched, unbroken, for hundreds of miles. I couldn’t see a sign of mankind. For 360 degrees, snowy peaks and glaciers disappeared into the curved horizon.
To describe it as breathtaking doesn’t really do it justice. It was so unlike any vista I had ever experienced before that I had no terms of reference. Many of these mountains far below me, were 6,000- and 7,000-metre peaks – anywhere else on the planet they would be dominating the geography, but here at nearly 9,000 metres, they were dwarfed by Everest. The surrounding Himalayas looked Lilliputian. I felt an insignificant, inconsequential dot in this vast, overwhelming landscape.
