The Lhotse flank

Strange. Since yesterday, Alex Txikon‘s GPS tracker, which is to document his ascent on Mount Everest, has not shown any movement. Lastly, an altitude of more than 6200 meters was displayed. Afterwards nothing. I’ve asked. “Yesterday they [Alex and the Sherpas who accompany him] went up to Camp 2 (6,400 meters), where they have slept,” Gontzal Saenz from the press team of the Basque climber writes to me. According to him, the GPS tracker has not been working correctly and is showing the wrong altitude. “I think they were going to keep climbing up today.” The goal was to prepare the route from Camp 3 at 7,400 meters to Camp 4 on the South Col at 7,950 meters by tomorrow. “The weather forecasts are very bad, with very strong winds, for the next few days,” writes Gontzal. “The plan is to return to the base camp tomorrow [Saturday] and wait there for the weather to improve again.”

Up to 190 kilometers per hour

Alex in the tent

That sounds reasonable. On Saturday morning, according to the weather forecast, the wind in the summit area is supposed to calm down to 25 km/h, but from Sunday onwards the weather will most probably turn really bad. Storms reaching hurricane strength with speeds of up to 190 m/h are expected during the next week. Alex and Co. should really sit out this weather in Base Camp. Due to the fact, that Txikon does not use bottled oxygen, he must be double-cautious. The lack of oxygen leads to increased breathing. This causes dehydration, the metabolism hardly works, the extremities are supplied only insufficiently. This increases the risk of frostbite on fingers and toes. If in addition strong wind cools your body, it can be quickly over with your extremities.

Rescue flight for Carlos Rubio

Alex Txikon has to re-plan. On Sunday his climbing partner on Mount Everest, Carlos Rubio, had to be evacuated by rescue helicopter to Kathmandu due to a lung inflammation. The 28-year-old Spaniard has meanwhile sent a video message from the hospital. His condition is not serious, but he has to recover for a few days at the clinic. “I know he is fine”, Alex Txikon wrote from Camp 3 at 7,400 meters, “but from here we miss him a lot, since he has worked like a champion and I am really proud of him.” Today Txikon and the Sherpas who accompany him want to pitch up Camp 4 at the South Col at almost 8,000 meters, “for all the force he has transmitted to us”, as Alex writes: “In short, this dream would not be possible without you, Carlos.”

Bitter first experience

Carlos on Everest

For Rubio, the dream of a successful winter ascent of Everest without bottled oxygen is over now. Prior to the expedition, Carlos had been rather new to this game. He had made more headlines as an extreme skier. But Txikon had praised him as representative of the new generation of Spanish climbers, he wanted to give him a chance: “I can not say that Carlos has experience in the Himalayas. But he is super strong, a really good climber.” It’s a pity that Carlos’ first experience on an eight-thousander resulted in a helicopter rescue.

No GPS tracker

Just like the fact that Carlos Rubio, according to Txikon, in the haste unintentionally took the GPS tracker in a bag. We will therefore have to forego information in real time, where exactly Alex and Co. are on the mountain. That’s no big deal, if you keep in mind that before satellite communication and internet were introduced, news from Everest had to be taken by post runners to Kathmandu first and thus had been sent out into the world only a couple of days later. We will not have to wait for news from Alex Txikon for such a long time – even without GPS tracker.