the truth is the climbing Everest was
definitely a bigger richer challenge 50
years ago the unknowns were larger the
margin slimmer the personal effort
greater Everest has in part become
domesticated the majesty of the mountain
and the meaning of climb minute have
changed
but it’s still a place to go and have
the adventure of your life
good evening everybody it’s great to see
such a big crowd we don’t really know
where we are unless we look at where
we’ve been so I want to go back through
the history a little bit started this
program so yeah 50 years ago Jim
Whittaker became the first American to
reach the summit of Everest he followed
the same path that sir edmund hillary
and tenzing norgay did 10 years earlier
three weeks later Tom Hornbein and
Willie unsold and kind of an
unprecedented sent clawed their way up
the West Ridge that same day buried
Bishop and Luke Jerstad were climbing
the southeast Ridge so the two teams met
up at 28,000 feet and they didn’t have
enough time to get off the mountain so
they bivouacked at 28,000 feet without a
tent without food without oxygen now
Willie ensel and Barry bishop between
them they lost 19 toes so it was a
fairly high price to pay that same
expedition also lost one climber Jake
breytenbach from Jackson Hole but it was
kind of the the moonshot of climbing at
the time these climbers fulfilled the
dream of Mallory who went to the
mountain in 1922 and in 1924 and died on
the mountain in 1924 he is standing
second went to the right there before it
was climbed in 1953 two dozen people had
died to reach the Sun trying to reach
the summit and most of them were Sherpas
hundreds of expeditions have come since
hundreds maybe even a thousand at this
point 1986 to Swiss guides Laura tonight
really made the first Alpine ascent of
Everest now most of these exponents
previously took three months an Alpine
ascent us to move very quickly with all
your gear they did the climb in 39 hours
up and down this is 1986 you might
believe at the time and I was on Everest
in 1986 and spent three months there
that this extraordinary Alpine ascent
laid the future out forever this is what
was going to happen you’d have more
difficult to sense
sense by stronger climbers that’s not
what happened a year earlier in 1985
dick bass became the first person guided
to the summit of Everest within a decade
early 90s Everest was being heavily
guided and it kind of ceased to be a
place where cutting-edge alpinist wanted
to go today over 4,000 people have
summited Everest and 200 people have
died trying so last spring Conrad
invited me on this expedition here’s our
route you can see base camp combe boo
ice fall camp one camp to up the load
see face camp three up to the South Col
and then you go up now the majority of
residents or climbers at ever space camp
on the south side are not climbers most
people know that their clients now some
of them know how to climb some of them
don’t and you can easily mock these
aspirants you can you can make fun of
them but I think you have to think about
this these are people who generally been
successful in some of the walk of life
and now they have enough skill on their
own field to know that you they don’t
have enough to climb Everest on their
own so they hire a guide and they could
easily be spending the 50 grand that it
costs in Vegas or they could be spending
it shooting some animal in Africa
instead these people are willing to go
up the Coombe boo Icefall this is it
risking their lives now the summit push
they always talk about that it doesn’t
really start it can’t for it starts
below that it starts at Camp three on
the load see face we spent the night
there Camp three get up in the morning
we went to sleep on a mountain and we
woke up in a traffic jam now we should
have known this we saw all these other
climbers but we didn’t I guess we just
did our I personally didn’t realize
they’re all going to go to the summit on
the same day right so we get up and
we’re suddenly in this traffic jam below
us or over a hundred climbers on the
ropes trudging knows too but just like
cattle above us another hundred climbers
on the
anyway after eight hours we got to the
camp for in the mid afternoon we spent
the day there so we started our climb at
about nine and evening this is typical
you started the night before you climb
through the night on the way you step
over people this was the first dead
climber we stepped over he looked as if
he was snapping in the snow his head was
covered by his parka ten minutes later
another body this woman wrapped in
Canadian flag and 20 minutes later
another corpse he still attached the
rope you’re going up this rope so you go
right over this person frozen solid his
face was black his eyes were wide open
these climbers had died a week earlier
during the first weather window and
afterwards I did interviews with their
Sherpas and I did I discovered in every
case the cause of death was arrogance
all three were told by their Sherpas
that they were moving too slowly that
even if they reached the summit they
wouldn’t make it back down they wouldn’t
have the strength to get back down and
they would die and all three refused to
turn around so when you read about
everest and everest is killing people
know hubris not Everest has killed these
climbers and standing on top I know I
should have felt elated but I actually
didn’t feel that way and and Everest has
changed this is what it looked like we
couldn’t actually stand on the summit or
I couldn’t there were 40 people on the
summit when I got there so I didn’t
actually get to stand on the very top
the truth is that climbing Everest was
definitely a bigger richer challenge 50
years ago the unknowns were larger the
margin slimmer the personal effort
direct greater Everest has in part
become domesticated the majesty of the
mountain
the meaning of climb minute have changed
yet there’s something to be to know all
guided climbers they all go up just two
routes either the southeast Ridge or the
North Col and from an aesthetic point of
view these are not particularly
attractive routes but there are probably
15 other routes on the mountain and
plenty of new route opportunities so
don’t imagine a mountain packed with
people that’s not the case you’ve got a
massive wondrous mountain with two lines
on it just two little ant lines and the
rest of the mountain is empty so everis
is a gorgeous place and they’re still
adventure to be had there we have to
think about what we want to have in the
future on Everest but it’s still a place
to go and have the adventure of your
life now I’d like to introduce Emily
Harrington come on up thanks mark so I
grew up in the climbing world and I had
this preconceived notion of what Everest
was like people in the core climbing
community sort of criticized Everest
much like what Mark was saying they say
that it’s not a mountain for climbers
that it’s not real climbing even that
it’s not hard so I’ve had this idea in
my head of what Evers was like up until
Conrad asked me last year to go on this
expedition and I had no idea what to
think about it but I decided to go and I
decided to go with an open mind and just
see what happened see what I learned out
of it and for me the challenges began
instantly as soon as I arrived at base
camp and one of the biggest things that
I faced on Everest the whole time was
this sort of fear and anticipation and
suspense of the unknown because I didn’t
know what to expect I’d never really
climbed mountains before so I had no
idea what I was getting into
then a really interesting thing happened
to me it was sort of like all that fear
washed away even though I was in this
incredibly dangerous place it was also
this beautiful place in this fascinating
place and when you’re in a situation
like that that’s super dangerous there’s
no control over the bad things that are
going to happen to you and so in a way I
learned to let that go another thing I
learned about everest is that there’s a
lot of relief and it comes in these
magnificent forms this is camp too and
it’s a truly special place I think that
anyone who spends any amount of time
there can recognize that you feel closer
to the stars it’s that it’s that kind of
place it has that kind of power entering
onto the load say face is where the
climbing starts to get a little bit more
real a little bit more serious it’s
steeper it’s more exposed it was made
more intimidating by the really
difficult conditions that we faced last
year Nepal had a really dry winter which
meant that there was very little snow
which meant that the load see face was
essentially a vertical ice rink so
instead of boot packing up snow we were
ice climbing up blue ice and then you
arrived at camp three it was also my
favorite place on the mountain I
remember one night that we got to spend
there and it was sunset and there was no
wind and it was perfectly calm and I’d
been through a lot at that point on the
mountain and emotionally and physically
and we got to watch the sunset we didn’t
even have to wear down jackets it wasn’t
even that cold and I just remember
thinking to myself this is a rare moment
in my life and this is why I’m here and
this is why it’s worth it and I was
super grateful at that time
i’m really glad i remember those moments
because they were super fleeting a lot
of time spent on Everest you’re spending
in a tent and it can be pretty miserable
but as I got higher on the mountain
these sort of like highs and lows got
more and more intense and I think this
attitude right here partially has to do
with the fact that I used oxygen after
camp 3 and I felt awesome I felt
stronger and warmer and my mind felt
more clear and not only that but you’re
getting close to the summit at that
point this is camp for and it’s like
being on another planet it’s called the
Death Zone because humans can’t exist
there for very long and that’s why we
don’t stay there for very long we left
for the summit the night of May
twenty-fourth at nine thirty at night we
all kind of left haphazardly at
different times and I was supposed to be
climbing with this Sherpa 10d and very
early on I got separated from him
because there were crowds and I was
passing people and he didn’t follow me
and there was a misunderstanding so in
the end I ended up in this long line of
floating head lamps and I didn’t know
anyone around me and I felt like if
something bad were to happen to me I
wasn’t sure anyone would be there to
help me so that was one of the most
trying moments for me while I was
actually climbing but I sort of
swallowed that fear and just kept going
and the Sun came up when I was probably
on the South Summit and I instantly felt
better it was like this magical relief
that I had I felt even though i was on
the summit ridge and both sides dropped
off 8,000 feet on either side of me I
just remember feeling safe for some
reason and I was just I just remember
thinking I’m okay now this is I’m gonna
be okay
and I reach the summit at six thirty in
the morning and like I said I kind of
envisioned being there with the rest of
my team so expected to have a
professional photographer with me but I
didn’t I thankfully and from technology
generation i had my iphone and i took
this panorama shot using my iphone and
then i took a selfie that I later
instagrammed at camp for I descended
from the summit after spending about 20
minutes there and I went all the way
down to camp to that night in the next
day I went to base camp and that was the
end of my Everest climb I’ve never been
to a place before where I felt like I’d
been completely stripped down to who I
was as a person I think as humans we
sort of live for these moments of
lightness and we learn from these
intense moments of darkness and I
experienced it all on Everest in this
very true and raw form and that’s why
I’m so grateful that I got to have the
experiences that I did and that place
will always be really important to me
for those reasons and now i’m going to
introduce Conrad
well thank you Emily and wow what a
treat to be here and have all of you
interested in Everest and what’s going
on there this was a real treat to invite
Emily on this exhibition she’s half the
age I am and mentoring people with what
you do and being out there was a big
part of why I’m in the mountains and I’m
confident that Emily he’s going to pass
that on when in not today but in a few
years so but instead of the story about
our expedition I’ll be talking about the
Sherpas and i’ll be sharing with you how
their culture has changed primarily
since nineteen fifty three onwards and
that being the first ascent of mount
everest sixty years ago with sir edmund
hillary and tenzing norgay from that
point on there’s been quite a bit of
change with being in the mountains and
how their culture has adapted to it and
it ended up being that they’d started
out in a Gurkha tral pastoral economy
and then all of a sudden climbing came
in there and with it the twentieth
century and now the 21st century and all
the trappings and downfalls but also the
benefits and all the things that really
make life special for that and probably
one of the most important things with
that is education and this was brought
to the Khumbu region by ed Hillary after
the 53 expedition so this is the
original come junk school that the
Himalayan trust built under the auspices
of thread Hillary but what this reflects
is that English is the lingua franca of
the guiding and trekking business yet
the Sherpas have been very adept at
keeping their own religion and their own
cultural practices without having to
worry about it being overtaken by these
Western influences yet as we know time
moves on every day is a new day and
everyone wants a better living in a
better existence for theirselves in the
future generations and that’s human
nature and we can’t fault them for that
and here we have a porter with his
mobile phone so he’s probably texting
his buddy or maybe he’s playing angry
birds or maybe he’s listening to music
on his phone but it’s been a great
things that allows them to to be better
employed they can then figure out what
the market rate for their work is where
work is available and throughout the
world whether you’re in Africa or
anywhere else mobile cell mobile
technology has really benefited the
people that don’t have is is great an
opportunity but the Sherpas we see here
they carry loads they unpack your bags
they pitch your tents to cook your meals
to entertain you they laugh they create
blessings for your expeditions all these
integral parts to it that create the
experience is with these people the
indigenous people that live in the
mountains that who are shaped by these
mountains and live there and are part of
them we’re really the meaningful part of
it to me and subsequently because my
existence is defined by being in the
mountains and I am a mountain climber in
2002 my wife Jenny and I set out to
create in honor of our Ginny’s Widow
late husband alex lowe and my climbing
partner who died on an expedition in
1999 on sheesha pong mom to something to
benefit the indigenous populations and
our project going on 10 years now is the
Khumbu climbing centre and our goal is
to teach climbing in a navigational
standpoint and to improve the safety
margin because unfortunately the Sherpas
just by dint of their work expose
themselves so far more risk than the
Western climbers that are going up there
so as much as I been given something by
being in the Himalayas it was my turn to
give something back and collectively
we’ve now taught over 700 of 700 people
to become better and safer climbers and
to hopefully create a communication in a
dialogue between the Western climbers
that are visiting the class
murs that work on the mountain and then
also the government that regulates the
climbing in nepal and to get all three
parties together and to see what our
goals and what our aspirations are but
nepal and the Sherpa people for them
Mount Everest is a very significant
mountain and there’s a lot of pride in
the mountain for 60 years now the
mountain has been climbed on the backs
of the strip of people and without their
work they would not be able to do it
it’s something that as a Western climber
we need to understand and behave
accordingly and didn’t understand that
this is a their mountain and that we are
at the end of the time guests in there
this is dr. LuAnn freer at everest base
camp clinic which all the Western
visitors chip in a hundred dollars to
staff it and then for the Sherpas and a
Nepali people that are there they get
free medical care and medical service
for us so it’s another way that trying
to work on what’s going on there and
it’s been a wonderful experience to
share my life with the the people of
Nepal and particularly the Sherpa people
in there and on this note I’d like to
introduce Alton who will take the stage
and give us our concluding information
about what’s going on there and some of
the challenges we see in the future
thank you
mmm well thank you very much for the
next few minutes I’d like to talk about
some of the environmental issues facing
the Mount Everest area and specifically
the the southern part of the mountain
the Nepal part which is Conrad mentioned
is the home of the Sherpa people who
came from Tibet about 500 years ago and
to me the Sherpa are among the most
innovative and adaptable people I’ve
ever seen in my life and life must have
been hard in the 1600s and 1700s and
1800s but then along about 1850 somebody
brings the potato from Darjeeling and
suddenly everybody has enough to eat and
the population starts to grow so that
was a really pivotal point in their
history then next within a few years
somebody figured out how to cross a yak
with a cow and get an animal called the
zopi oh which looks you know kind of
like a yak and kind of like Cal but it
can carry much more weight it has a much
better disposition and most importantly
they can work below altitudes of 9,000
feet so now the Sherpa become animal
breeders expert animal breeders well
then in nineteen hundred they start a
trade system between tibet and nepal the
trading tibetan salt for Napoli’s rice
and other goods and because they’re
right in the middle of the trade route
many of them have a monopoly and they
become quite wealthy so this one on to
the 40s and the 50s and then China
invades Tibet no more trade that would
have been catastrophic for almost any
other ethnic group but not the Sherpas
meanwhile Everest rather Nepal had been
opened in the 1950s to the outside world
Everest had been climbed in 1953 and
that opened the door for a new form of
cash cow called the adventure tourists
uh-huh also known as people of the white
lips by some Sherpas
and the cultural landscape was
transformed from the traditional trading
agro pastoralism to himalayan lodge
owners and trekking guides and
mountaineering guides that have endeared
themselves to generations of climbers in
the area so many Sherpa families have
gotten quite wealthy especially those
that live along the have property along
the main trekking route but it has come
at a cost here’s one of the costs you
know every village that you pass on the
way to the everest base camp these days
has landfills every year a new landfill
the garbage goes in it does not go out
now this is burned it’s an environmental
hazard it’s a hazard for human and
animal health because they are often
located in seasonal watercourses and
that contaminates the groundwater
likewise what happens when you put
hundreds and hundreds of outhouses
directly over flowing streams or
seasonal watercourses you get water
contamination and the incidence of
diarrhea and dysentery just grows and
grows with each passing year and no
you’ve wondered what happens to all that
wastes the human waste produced by those
900 people up at the everest base camp
over many months each spring and each
fall well in fact they have an under
pretty good control in the Everest base
camp it’s collected in plastic
linebarrels such as these underneath the
outhouses such as that to the left and I
asked a porter well what do you do with
it now and he said oh we take it down
the road about 0 to 2 hours or so and
then head west and go through a ravine
and over some hills and we dump it in a
pit there and and I knew that I must
find this place so
so I I did I I went and found it and
believe me the last half mile I needed
no landmarks and and there it was it was
a swimming pool size six foot deep pit
filled with leaking bags of human waste
right in the middle of a seasonal water
course so when the monsoon rains come
down that contamination go and it’s not
doing anybody any favors downstream
another driver of change in the area is
rising temperatures and in the last 30
years we’ve seen dozens hundreds of
small glaciers at the lower altitudes
18,000 feet lower disappear other
glaciers such as this the MSHA glacier
in 1950 have now turned into lakes as
the glacier receives it leaves behind a
large lake and these can often be quite
dangerous in the event of a glacial lake
outburst flood now the trigger can be an
earthquake or nine times out of ten it’s
going to be a huge mass of ice as you
can see here on the north face of chum
lung that dislodges and cascades into
the lake and it creates a surge wave
that breaches the fragile terminal
moraine then you’ve got millions and
millions of cubic meters of water
cascading down valley if the mg lake
does break out and we have a glacial
lake outburst flood it could kill
hundreds of people it could destroy
several different villages it would
certainly destroy the economy of the
Mount Everest area that’s so dependent
on tourism and would have a severe
effect on tourism in Nepal these days I
co manage a project called a high
mountain glacier watershed program is
funded by the US Agency for
International Development and one of the
things we’re doing and what I was doing
all last month is helping local people
develop climate change adaptation plans
we’re also combining the best of
indigenous knowledge and believe
local people really know what’s going on
up in the high mountains with modern
technologies such as this sonar based
bathymetric survey that told us exactly
how much water is in that lake so we can
figure out how to lower it we think by
at least 20 meters to reduce the risk
I’m going to end with a couple of good
news stories it is not all doom and
gloom there are many many good news
stories in the mount everest area one is
that trees are coming back this is the
tank bush a hill in 1950 and here it is
a couple of years ago and you can see
the trees are coming back in full force
and I think that that’s directly related
to the excellent work of Sir Edmund
Hillary to the National Park the second
Martha National Park changing land use
patterns they’re decreasing numbers of
cattle these days and warming trends
another good news story is that the
Alpine the land above the trees ever
since for the last 50 60 years since
Hillary and Tenzing climbed Everest had
been pummeled by climbing expeditions
and lodges and trekking expeditions who
would rip out the shrub juniper and it
takes forever to grow a little little
stem this big takes about 150 200 years
to reach that size so but that too
thanks to a grant from the National
Geographic of the American Alpine Club
about ten years ago we were able to help
local people form an alpine conservation
committee that is now effectively
reversing these trends of environmental
degradation and that’s just two stories
there many more so I’m going to end here
with this photograph of Fritz Muller a
Swiss Canadian glaciologist back in the
1950s to illustrate a point I think
you’ve heard through all of our
presentations tonight and that is you
just never know what’s going to happen
when Fritz was staring through this
theodolite in 1956 his greatest fear was
that the little ice age would return
that temperatures would get colder that
the glaciers would once again grow
and plummet down the valleys destroying
everything in their path and the exact
opposite happened an unthinkable trend
of warming and in glacial recession and
glacial lake formation likewise the
climber cartographer Kerwin Schneider he
wrote rather lightheartedly that well
perhaps the day will come when travel
agencies will bring tourists to see the
world’s highest mountain he didn’t
believe it he was making a joke I mean
why would anybody come to the Mount
Everest area when you could go to Hawaii
or Ohio or someplace like fall but the
exact opposite happened now we have
36,000 adventure tourists per year if
you add the support staff that’s a
hundred thousand non-local people who go
up the trail to the Everest base camp
and which is very small and very fragile
so you never know what’s going to happen
and many is the evening that I’ve set
outside my tent looking up at Mount
Everest in the Alpen glow and wondering
what in the world would Schneider and
Muller say if they could see this area
to today thank you very much
you
Oh
definitely a bigger richer challenge 50
years ago the unknowns were larger the
margin slimmer the personal effort
greater Everest has in part become
domesticated the majesty of the mountain
and the meaning of climb minute have
changed
but it’s still a place to go and have
the adventure of your life
good evening everybody it’s great to see
such a big crowd we don’t really know
where we are unless we look at where
we’ve been so I want to go back through
the history a little bit started this
program so yeah 50 years ago Jim
Whittaker became the first American to
reach the summit of Everest he followed
the same path that sir edmund hillary
and tenzing norgay did 10 years earlier
three weeks later Tom Hornbein and
Willie unsold and kind of an
unprecedented sent clawed their way up
the West Ridge that same day buried
Bishop and Luke Jerstad were climbing
the southeast Ridge so the two teams met
up at 28,000 feet and they didn’t have
enough time to get off the mountain so
they bivouacked at 28,000 feet without a
tent without food without oxygen now
Willie ensel and Barry bishop between
them they lost 19 toes so it was a
fairly high price to pay that same
expedition also lost one climber Jake
breytenbach from Jackson Hole but it was
kind of the the moonshot of climbing at
the time these climbers fulfilled the
dream of Mallory who went to the
mountain in 1922 and in 1924 and died on
the mountain in 1924 he is standing
second went to the right there before it
was climbed in 1953 two dozen people had
died to reach the Sun trying to reach
the summit and most of them were Sherpas
hundreds of expeditions have come since
hundreds maybe even a thousand at this
point 1986 to Swiss guides Laura tonight
really made the first Alpine ascent of
Everest now most of these exponents
previously took three months an Alpine
ascent us to move very quickly with all
your gear they did the climb in 39 hours
up and down this is 1986 you might
believe at the time and I was on Everest
in 1986 and spent three months there
that this extraordinary Alpine ascent
laid the future out forever this is what
was going to happen you’d have more
difficult to sense
sense by stronger climbers that’s not
what happened a year earlier in 1985
dick bass became the first person guided
to the summit of Everest within a decade
early 90s Everest was being heavily
guided and it kind of ceased to be a
place where cutting-edge alpinist wanted
to go today over 4,000 people have
summited Everest and 200 people have
died trying so last spring Conrad
invited me on this expedition here’s our
route you can see base camp combe boo
ice fall camp one camp to up the load
see face camp three up to the South Col
and then you go up now the majority of
residents or climbers at ever space camp
on the south side are not climbers most
people know that their clients now some
of them know how to climb some of them
don’t and you can easily mock these
aspirants you can you can make fun of
them but I think you have to think about
this these are people who generally been
successful in some of the walk of life
and now they have enough skill on their
own field to know that you they don’t
have enough to climb Everest on their
own so they hire a guide and they could
easily be spending the 50 grand that it
costs in Vegas or they could be spending
it shooting some animal in Africa
instead these people are willing to go
up the Coombe boo Icefall this is it
risking their lives now the summit push
they always talk about that it doesn’t
really start it can’t for it starts
below that it starts at Camp three on
the load see face we spent the night
there Camp three get up in the morning
we went to sleep on a mountain and we
woke up in a traffic jam now we should
have known this we saw all these other
climbers but we didn’t I guess we just
did our I personally didn’t realize
they’re all going to go to the summit on
the same day right so we get up and
we’re suddenly in this traffic jam below
us or over a hundred climbers on the
ropes trudging knows too but just like
cattle above us another hundred climbers
on the
anyway after eight hours we got to the
camp for in the mid afternoon we spent
the day there so we started our climb at
about nine and evening this is typical
you started the night before you climb
through the night on the way you step
over people this was the first dead
climber we stepped over he looked as if
he was snapping in the snow his head was
covered by his parka ten minutes later
another body this woman wrapped in
Canadian flag and 20 minutes later
another corpse he still attached the
rope you’re going up this rope so you go
right over this person frozen solid his
face was black his eyes were wide open
these climbers had died a week earlier
during the first weather window and
afterwards I did interviews with their
Sherpas and I did I discovered in every
case the cause of death was arrogance
all three were told by their Sherpas
that they were moving too slowly that
even if they reached the summit they
wouldn’t make it back down they wouldn’t
have the strength to get back down and
they would die and all three refused to
turn around so when you read about
everest and everest is killing people
know hubris not Everest has killed these
climbers and standing on top I know I
should have felt elated but I actually
didn’t feel that way and and Everest has
changed this is what it looked like we
couldn’t actually stand on the summit or
I couldn’t there were 40 people on the
summit when I got there so I didn’t
actually get to stand on the very top
the truth is that climbing Everest was
definitely a bigger richer challenge 50
years ago the unknowns were larger the
margin slimmer the personal effort
direct greater Everest has in part
become domesticated the majesty of the
mountain
the meaning of climb minute have changed
yet there’s something to be to know all
guided climbers they all go up just two
routes either the southeast Ridge or the
North Col and from an aesthetic point of
view these are not particularly
attractive routes but there are probably
15 other routes on the mountain and
plenty of new route opportunities so
don’t imagine a mountain packed with
people that’s not the case you’ve got a
massive wondrous mountain with two lines
on it just two little ant lines and the
rest of the mountain is empty so everis
is a gorgeous place and they’re still
adventure to be had there we have to
think about what we want to have in the
future on Everest but it’s still a place
to go and have the adventure of your
life now I’d like to introduce Emily
Harrington come on up thanks mark so I
grew up in the climbing world and I had
this preconceived notion of what Everest
was like people in the core climbing
community sort of criticized Everest
much like what Mark was saying they say
that it’s not a mountain for climbers
that it’s not real climbing even that
it’s not hard so I’ve had this idea in
my head of what Evers was like up until
Conrad asked me last year to go on this
expedition and I had no idea what to
think about it but I decided to go and I
decided to go with an open mind and just
see what happened see what I learned out
of it and for me the challenges began
instantly as soon as I arrived at base
camp and one of the biggest things that
I faced on Everest the whole time was
this sort of fear and anticipation and
suspense of the unknown because I didn’t
know what to expect I’d never really
climbed mountains before so I had no
idea what I was getting into
then a really interesting thing happened
to me it was sort of like all that fear
washed away even though I was in this
incredibly dangerous place it was also
this beautiful place in this fascinating
place and when you’re in a situation
like that that’s super dangerous there’s
no control over the bad things that are
going to happen to you and so in a way I
learned to let that go another thing I
learned about everest is that there’s a
lot of relief and it comes in these
magnificent forms this is camp too and
it’s a truly special place I think that
anyone who spends any amount of time
there can recognize that you feel closer
to the stars it’s that it’s that kind of
place it has that kind of power entering
onto the load say face is where the
climbing starts to get a little bit more
real a little bit more serious it’s
steeper it’s more exposed it was made
more intimidating by the really
difficult conditions that we faced last
year Nepal had a really dry winter which
meant that there was very little snow
which meant that the load see face was
essentially a vertical ice rink so
instead of boot packing up snow we were
ice climbing up blue ice and then you
arrived at camp three it was also my
favorite place on the mountain I
remember one night that we got to spend
there and it was sunset and there was no
wind and it was perfectly calm and I’d
been through a lot at that point on the
mountain and emotionally and physically
and we got to watch the sunset we didn’t
even have to wear down jackets it wasn’t
even that cold and I just remember
thinking to myself this is a rare moment
in my life and this is why I’m here and
this is why it’s worth it and I was
super grateful at that time
i’m really glad i remember those moments
because they were super fleeting a lot
of time spent on Everest you’re spending
in a tent and it can be pretty miserable
but as I got higher on the mountain
these sort of like highs and lows got
more and more intense and I think this
attitude right here partially has to do
with the fact that I used oxygen after
camp 3 and I felt awesome I felt
stronger and warmer and my mind felt
more clear and not only that but you’re
getting close to the summit at that
point this is camp for and it’s like
being on another planet it’s called the
Death Zone because humans can’t exist
there for very long and that’s why we
don’t stay there for very long we left
for the summit the night of May
twenty-fourth at nine thirty at night we
all kind of left haphazardly at
different times and I was supposed to be
climbing with this Sherpa 10d and very
early on I got separated from him
because there were crowds and I was
passing people and he didn’t follow me
and there was a misunderstanding so in
the end I ended up in this long line of
floating head lamps and I didn’t know
anyone around me and I felt like if
something bad were to happen to me I
wasn’t sure anyone would be there to
help me so that was one of the most
trying moments for me while I was
actually climbing but I sort of
swallowed that fear and just kept going
and the Sun came up when I was probably
on the South Summit and I instantly felt
better it was like this magical relief
that I had I felt even though i was on
the summit ridge and both sides dropped
off 8,000 feet on either side of me I
just remember feeling safe for some
reason and I was just I just remember
thinking I’m okay now this is I’m gonna
be okay
and I reach the summit at six thirty in
the morning and like I said I kind of
envisioned being there with the rest of
my team so expected to have a
professional photographer with me but I
didn’t I thankfully and from technology
generation i had my iphone and i took
this panorama shot using my iphone and
then i took a selfie that I later
instagrammed at camp for I descended
from the summit after spending about 20
minutes there and I went all the way
down to camp to that night in the next
day I went to base camp and that was the
end of my Everest climb I’ve never been
to a place before where I felt like I’d
been completely stripped down to who I
was as a person I think as humans we
sort of live for these moments of
lightness and we learn from these
intense moments of darkness and I
experienced it all on Everest in this
very true and raw form and that’s why
I’m so grateful that I got to have the
experiences that I did and that place
will always be really important to me
for those reasons and now i’m going to
introduce Conrad
well thank you Emily and wow what a
treat to be here and have all of you
interested in Everest and what’s going
on there this was a real treat to invite
Emily on this exhibition she’s half the
age I am and mentoring people with what
you do and being out there was a big
part of why I’m in the mountains and I’m
confident that Emily he’s going to pass
that on when in not today but in a few
years so but instead of the story about
our expedition I’ll be talking about the
Sherpas and i’ll be sharing with you how
their culture has changed primarily
since nineteen fifty three onwards and
that being the first ascent of mount
everest sixty years ago with sir edmund
hillary and tenzing norgay from that
point on there’s been quite a bit of
change with being in the mountains and
how their culture has adapted to it and
it ended up being that they’d started
out in a Gurkha tral pastoral economy
and then all of a sudden climbing came
in there and with it the twentieth
century and now the 21st century and all
the trappings and downfalls but also the
benefits and all the things that really
make life special for that and probably
one of the most important things with
that is education and this was brought
to the Khumbu region by ed Hillary after
the 53 expedition so this is the
original come junk school that the
Himalayan trust built under the auspices
of thread Hillary but what this reflects
is that English is the lingua franca of
the guiding and trekking business yet
the Sherpas have been very adept at
keeping their own religion and their own
cultural practices without having to
worry about it being overtaken by these
Western influences yet as we know time
moves on every day is a new day and
everyone wants a better living in a
better existence for theirselves in the
future generations and that’s human
nature and we can’t fault them for that
and here we have a porter with his
mobile phone so he’s probably texting
his buddy or maybe he’s playing angry
birds or maybe he’s listening to music
on his phone but it’s been a great
things that allows them to to be better
employed they can then figure out what
the market rate for their work is where
work is available and throughout the
world whether you’re in Africa or
anywhere else mobile cell mobile
technology has really benefited the
people that don’t have is is great an
opportunity but the Sherpas we see here
they carry loads they unpack your bags
they pitch your tents to cook your meals
to entertain you they laugh they create
blessings for your expeditions all these
integral parts to it that create the
experience is with these people the
indigenous people that live in the
mountains that who are shaped by these
mountains and live there and are part of
them we’re really the meaningful part of
it to me and subsequently because my
existence is defined by being in the
mountains and I am a mountain climber in
2002 my wife Jenny and I set out to
create in honor of our Ginny’s Widow
late husband alex lowe and my climbing
partner who died on an expedition in
1999 on sheesha pong mom to something to
benefit the indigenous populations and
our project going on 10 years now is the
Khumbu climbing centre and our goal is
to teach climbing in a navigational
standpoint and to improve the safety
margin because unfortunately the Sherpas
just by dint of their work expose
themselves so far more risk than the
Western climbers that are going up there
so as much as I been given something by
being in the Himalayas it was my turn to
give something back and collectively
we’ve now taught over 700 of 700 people
to become better and safer climbers and
to hopefully create a communication in a
dialogue between the Western climbers
that are visiting the class
murs that work on the mountain and then
also the government that regulates the
climbing in nepal and to get all three
parties together and to see what our
goals and what our aspirations are but
nepal and the Sherpa people for them
Mount Everest is a very significant
mountain and there’s a lot of pride in
the mountain for 60 years now the
mountain has been climbed on the backs
of the strip of people and without their
work they would not be able to do it
it’s something that as a Western climber
we need to understand and behave
accordingly and didn’t understand that
this is a their mountain and that we are
at the end of the time guests in there
this is dr. LuAnn freer at everest base
camp clinic which all the Western
visitors chip in a hundred dollars to
staff it and then for the Sherpas and a
Nepali people that are there they get
free medical care and medical service
for us so it’s another way that trying
to work on what’s going on there and
it’s been a wonderful experience to
share my life with the the people of
Nepal and particularly the Sherpa people
in there and on this note I’d like to
introduce Alton who will take the stage
and give us our concluding information
about what’s going on there and some of
the challenges we see in the future
thank you
mmm well thank you very much for the
next few minutes I’d like to talk about
some of the environmental issues facing
the Mount Everest area and specifically
the the southern part of the mountain
the Nepal part which is Conrad mentioned
is the home of the Sherpa people who
came from Tibet about 500 years ago and
to me the Sherpa are among the most
innovative and adaptable people I’ve
ever seen in my life and life must have
been hard in the 1600s and 1700s and
1800s but then along about 1850 somebody
brings the potato from Darjeeling and
suddenly everybody has enough to eat and
the population starts to grow so that
was a really pivotal point in their
history then next within a few years
somebody figured out how to cross a yak
with a cow and get an animal called the
zopi oh which looks you know kind of
like a yak and kind of like Cal but it
can carry much more weight it has a much
better disposition and most importantly
they can work below altitudes of 9,000
feet so now the Sherpa become animal
breeders expert animal breeders well
then in nineteen hundred they start a
trade system between tibet and nepal the
trading tibetan salt for Napoli’s rice
and other goods and because they’re
right in the middle of the trade route
many of them have a monopoly and they
become quite wealthy so this one on to
the 40s and the 50s and then China
invades Tibet no more trade that would
have been catastrophic for almost any
other ethnic group but not the Sherpas
meanwhile Everest rather Nepal had been
opened in the 1950s to the outside world
Everest had been climbed in 1953 and
that opened the door for a new form of
cash cow called the adventure tourists
uh-huh also known as people of the white
lips by some Sherpas
and the cultural landscape was
transformed from the traditional trading
agro pastoralism to himalayan lodge
owners and trekking guides and
mountaineering guides that have endeared
themselves to generations of climbers in
the area so many Sherpa families have
gotten quite wealthy especially those
that live along the have property along
the main trekking route but it has come
at a cost here’s one of the costs you
know every village that you pass on the
way to the everest base camp these days
has landfills every year a new landfill
the garbage goes in it does not go out
now this is burned it’s an environmental
hazard it’s a hazard for human and
animal health because they are often
located in seasonal watercourses and
that contaminates the groundwater
likewise what happens when you put
hundreds and hundreds of outhouses
directly over flowing streams or
seasonal watercourses you get water
contamination and the incidence of
diarrhea and dysentery just grows and
grows with each passing year and no
you’ve wondered what happens to all that
wastes the human waste produced by those
900 people up at the everest base camp
over many months each spring and each
fall well in fact they have an under
pretty good control in the Everest base
camp it’s collected in plastic
linebarrels such as these underneath the
outhouses such as that to the left and I
asked a porter well what do you do with
it now and he said oh we take it down
the road about 0 to 2 hours or so and
then head west and go through a ravine
and over some hills and we dump it in a
pit there and and I knew that I must
find this place so
so I I did I I went and found it and
believe me the last half mile I needed
no landmarks and and there it was it was
a swimming pool size six foot deep pit
filled with leaking bags of human waste
right in the middle of a seasonal water
course so when the monsoon rains come
down that contamination go and it’s not
doing anybody any favors downstream
another driver of change in the area is
rising temperatures and in the last 30
years we’ve seen dozens hundreds of
small glaciers at the lower altitudes
18,000 feet lower disappear other
glaciers such as this the MSHA glacier
in 1950 have now turned into lakes as
the glacier receives it leaves behind a
large lake and these can often be quite
dangerous in the event of a glacial lake
outburst flood now the trigger can be an
earthquake or nine times out of ten it’s
going to be a huge mass of ice as you
can see here on the north face of chum
lung that dislodges and cascades into
the lake and it creates a surge wave
that breaches the fragile terminal
moraine then you’ve got millions and
millions of cubic meters of water
cascading down valley if the mg lake
does break out and we have a glacial
lake outburst flood it could kill
hundreds of people it could destroy
several different villages it would
certainly destroy the economy of the
Mount Everest area that’s so dependent
on tourism and would have a severe
effect on tourism in Nepal these days I
co manage a project called a high
mountain glacier watershed program is
funded by the US Agency for
International Development and one of the
things we’re doing and what I was doing
all last month is helping local people
develop climate change adaptation plans
we’re also combining the best of
indigenous knowledge and believe
local people really know what’s going on
up in the high mountains with modern
technologies such as this sonar based
bathymetric survey that told us exactly
how much water is in that lake so we can
figure out how to lower it we think by
at least 20 meters to reduce the risk
I’m going to end with a couple of good
news stories it is not all doom and
gloom there are many many good news
stories in the mount everest area one is
that trees are coming back this is the
tank bush a hill in 1950 and here it is
a couple of years ago and you can see
the trees are coming back in full force
and I think that that’s directly related
to the excellent work of Sir Edmund
Hillary to the National Park the second
Martha National Park changing land use
patterns they’re decreasing numbers of
cattle these days and warming trends
another good news story is that the
Alpine the land above the trees ever
since for the last 50 60 years since
Hillary and Tenzing climbed Everest had
been pummeled by climbing expeditions
and lodges and trekking expeditions who
would rip out the shrub juniper and it
takes forever to grow a little little
stem this big takes about 150 200 years
to reach that size so but that too
thanks to a grant from the National
Geographic of the American Alpine Club
about ten years ago we were able to help
local people form an alpine conservation
committee that is now effectively
reversing these trends of environmental
degradation and that’s just two stories
there many more so I’m going to end here
with this photograph of Fritz Muller a
Swiss Canadian glaciologist back in the
1950s to illustrate a point I think
you’ve heard through all of our
presentations tonight and that is you
just never know what’s going to happen
when Fritz was staring through this
theodolite in 1956 his greatest fear was
that the little ice age would return
that temperatures would get colder that
the glaciers would once again grow
and plummet down the valleys destroying
everything in their path and the exact
opposite happened an unthinkable trend
of warming and in glacial recession and
glacial lake formation likewise the
climber cartographer Kerwin Schneider he
wrote rather lightheartedly that well
perhaps the day will come when travel
agencies will bring tourists to see the
world’s highest mountain he didn’t
believe it he was making a joke I mean
why would anybody come to the Mount
Everest area when you could go to Hawaii
or Ohio or someplace like fall but the
exact opposite happened now we have
36,000 adventure tourists per year if
you add the support staff that’s a
hundred thousand non-local people who go
up the trail to the Everest base camp
and which is very small and very fragile
so you never know what’s going to happen
and many is the evening that I’ve set
outside my tent looking up at Mount
Everest in the Alpen glow and wondering
what in the world would Schneider and
Muller say if they could see this area
to today thank you very much
you
Oh
Please follow and like us: