Into Thin Air 18-21

In chapter 18 of Into Thin Air, Krakauer explains the attempt of three Ladakhis’s climb to the summit. The conditions were so bad on the mountain that they thought they had reached the summit at 4:00 P.M., when really they were 500 feet below the summit.  That’s why they never passed Hansen, Lopsang, or Hall at the top.  In such harsh conditions like these, other teams are not looking to help; they need to survive themselves. Shigekawa says, “We were too tired to help. Above 8,000 meters is not a place where people can afford morality” (253). This is hard to think about in our society because we all would like to help people who are hurt, but up in such high altitudes with less oxygen and high winds, it’s unrealistic. Three of the Indian men (Smanla, Morup, Palijor) were found dead on May 17^th, and they were left where they fell.

Without guides, Krakauer’s team needed someone to lead. Stuart Hutchinson, a medical researcher from Montreal, decided to step into the position. One morning, Hutchinson stumbled on the bodies of Namba and Beck. They were twenty feet apart from each other and only their hands and feet were sticking out of the ice. Miraculously, they both were breathing, but Hutchinson could tell they weren’t going to make it, so he left them. He was shaken, but he made the right decision. Later, Beck somehow survives and makes it back to camp. Boukreev also goes back to find Fischer from seeing Weathers alive, but by the time he returns Fischer is dead. With the death count rising altitude getting to everyone’s head, it’s hard to stay sane in difficult situations. I like this quote by Krakauer; he says, “I wondered if I had begun the downward spiral into the nightmarish territory of the mad” (257). It explains how Krakauer realizes he is making mistakes that he usually wouldn’t make, questioning his sanity.

In chapter 20, everyone makes it down to Camp Two and find plenty of resources they needed. A helicopter came and landed. It first took Gau because he seemed to be in worse shape than Weathers, but the helicopter came back for Beck shortly. Krakauer realizes what he had been through in the past 72 hours. It’s hard for him to comprehend, but he gets through it and makes his way down to the Icefall. In the final chapter, Krakauer has a hard time dealing with everything that had happened on the mountain. He begins crying and doesn’t want to deal with any of the reporters. He speaks to Rob Hall’s wife and has a more difficult time talking about him than she does. Krakauer ends the chapter with facts about the other expeditions. Would you go on a trip like this if you knew how much it would impact your life emotionally? 

-April Cust

Into Thin Air 15-17

The road down from the summit was a struggle itself for Krakauer. As seen in the last chapter, he couldn't stay up at the summit for too long. Now, in chapter 15, during his assent down from the summit, Krakauer takes note of those passing him. As the others teams struggle, Krakauer faces his own struggles with the little to no visibility along with hurricane like winds. I can't imagine the kind of fear he must of had; not knowing exactly where you were going. But, Krakauer's emotions weren't demonstrated here as much. It was then that he was told that both Weathers and Namba are dead at this point. This shows that, unlike the other chapters, Krakauer is focusing on the feelings the others must feel rather than he, himself, telling us exactly what he is feeling.

In Chapter 16, Kraukauer expresses his shock, guilt, and sorrow over the loss of Andy Harris. To me, at least, it was different to see Kraukauer express his feelings over Andy than the others. In a sense, to Krakauer, it was like seeing a superhero finally fall. He thought whole-heartedly that Harris would be the few to make it. His guilt continues to rise throughout the chapter, expressing his shock when he found the true reason for Harris' demise. Realizing the cold hard truth hits him hard- continuously questioning himself as to how he could make such a critical mistake. To me, this shocked me seeing Krakauer in such a state. I'm so used to seeing him as the underdog, but seeing him suffer to the extent he says, makes me feel sorry for him. I can't imagine how haunting that must be, to always wonder what exactly happened to Harris.

In Chapter 17, Krakauer now flips back to Everest and tells the story of how Hall's last moments was. Though I was confused at first of the change of shift, I realized that this story definitely took a turn. Telling the story of Hall's death, I feel, might of have been a sense of healing for Krakauer. Unlike Harris, there wasn't much he could do for Hall and finding his body at the end gave him cold, hard facts as to how Hall died. I can't imagine watching the two people that Krakauer put faith in crumble, let alone if I imagined watching the important people in my life crumble before me. Can you?

Into Thin Air 10-14

Chapter ten is about the accent from camp two up to camp three. The obstacle to climb between the two camps is the Lhotse Face.  Once Krakauer gets to camp 3 he comes to the realization that climbing Everest is all about enduring extreme amounts of pain. "And in subjecting ourselves to week after week of toil, tedium, and suffering, it struck me that most of us were probably seeking, above all else, something like the state of grace." HACE also known as High Altitude Cerebral Edema was also a topic in chapter ten because Dale Kruse came down with it and the disease is extremely deadly. Kruse was a part of Fishers expedition but it made everyone nervous fearing they were also vulnerable. Now that the acclimation period was over Krakauer has lost almost twenty pounds and had a bad hack in his cough which was very painful to him. I still don't understand how in this amount of pain Krakauer still managed to keep on trekking up the mountain. The order that the teams would follow in going to the summit is also revealed to us in the chapter. Goran Kropp would make a lone attempt on May 3rd and then the team from Montenegro. On May 8th or 9th the IMAX team would go and then followed by Hall and Fischers team on the 10th. The South African team also started another issue when they decided they would summit whenever they pleased most likely on the 10th as well. Chapter 11 starts with the summit push beginning. They left base camp at 4:30 AM and went to camp 2 which they got to at 10 :30 AM. Once they left camp two a boulder the size of a Television came down and hit guide Andy Harris in the chest. He got knocked off his feet but because he was attached to the ropes he didn't tumble down the mountain and it saved his life. At camp three the Sherpas couldn't stay there with the expedition clients because it wasn't big enough which meant the clients had to prepare there own food and water. At 24,000 feet Krakauer was hacking at the ice with his axe and putting the chunks into garbage bags which he gave to the people in the tents to use for drinking water. The scariest part of this chapter is when Chen Yunan woke up in the morning to go to the bathroom and didn't put his crampons on. This made him lose his footing and fall 70 feet into a crevasse but he managed to survive. They got him out but a few hours later he stopped breathing and died. This was the first death on the mountain so far that anybody in this expedition had been present for and it sent a chilling vibe to everyone. Chapter twelve is when they leave camp three to go to camp four. Krakauer talks about how he is fearful of another ice block hitting him like what happened to Harris. The biggest debate in the chapter is how a sherpa had short roped himself to Pittman and carried her up the mountain for about 5 hours. Pittman claims he forcefully did this to her but the Sherpa says 2 different stories. It is come to an understanding that Fischer most likely told his sherpa to make sure Pittman got to the top because she was a reporting and famous as well and he wanted the publicity as a guide that he gets his clients to the summit. Krakauer also has to climb over the Hillary Step which is right beneath the summit and is a 40 foot vertical step of rock and ice that you have to climb. Krakauer then reached the summit but talks about how it wasn't that fun at all because of how difficult the conditions were. He says he had the sensation of being underwater and that he realized the top was only halfway because they still had to make it down alive. Next in Chapter 14 Krakauer has to climb back down the Hillary Step and there is bottle neck of traffic which makes him nervous. Then a guy named Adams says how he notices that the sky is forming into storm clouds but nobody really notices this probably due to the lack of oxygen leading to minimal brain functioning. At 4:45 Krakauer reaches the balcony at 27,600 feet on the Southeast ridge where Beck Weathers is standing there shivering. We learn that Beck underwent a surgery for his eyes and that as a result of the extremely high altitude he can no longer see. Krakauer leaves him there because he wants to wait  for Ron whom he promised to wait for earlier. This probably would be the last time Krakauer sees Weathers if i had to guess.  Right before Krakaur gets to back down to camp four Harris falls almost 70 feet down the ledge but gets up alright. Krakauer then methodically goes down the ice and makes it to camp four in one piece. Little does he know though that 19 people were stuck on the mountain about to endure a awful storm. The anticipation to read the next chapters are almost too much to handle because Krakauer set up this chapter in a brilliant way. We know now the disaster is about to play out and i feel bad wanting to know who dies and who lives.

-Sam