Kili in the early morning

The summit certificate is lying at home, so I could actually tick off Kilimanjaro. But Africa’s highest mountain is still on my mind half a week after my return home. My feelings were too ambiguous during the eight days on the highest mountain in Africa. On the one hand I was able to experience hospitable and helpful Tanzanians, a harmonious expedition team and a really impressive nature. The ascent through the various vegetation levels gave me many unforgettable moments. On the other hand, I realized once more the downsides of mass tourism on the mountains.

Human waste along the way

Caravan to Kibo Hut

Even though about 30,000 people try to climb Mount Kilimanjaro every year, there is neither a coherent plan for hygiene nor for waste disposal. For example, at the Kibo Hut, at 4700 meters, there are some simple toilets, but there is no water to wash your hands. The few toilet shacks along the Marangu route are little more than spoilage. Behind almost every boulder next to the path lie human excrements and toilet paper. In addition, many summit aspirants throw away their garbage thoughtlessly.

Better chances for fat people?!

In the end on the ground

Never before I have seen on a mountain so many unreasonable summit aspirants overestimating themselves as on the almost six-thousander, located south of the equator. For example, the British teenager who was reeling already at about 4000 meters, with glassy eyes. He said he was just tired. His expedition leader first ignored our suggestion that the boy was suffering from high altitude sickness. The same expedition leader had told me the day before that according to his experience, fat people had a particularly good chance of reaching the summit. The reason he gave: Fat people were also moving slowly in everyday life, and that was just the right tactic on Kilimanjaro.

Wheeled stretchers  in continuous use

I saw Koreans, who looked as exhausted after the ascent to Kibo Hut as Hermann Buhl in 1953 after his legendary solo summit push on Nanga Parbat. A few hours later, they headed for Uhuru Peak, filled with Diamox, as the empty blister packs on the toilet proved. Some had to be carried down the mountain and then transported downhill with wheeled stretchers. No day passed without such rescue operations. Even though there is not yet a mountain rescue in the narrower sense on Kili. Hyperbaric bags for first aid at the Kibo Hut? None. When our doctor from the University of Marburg temporarily used bottled oxygen to treat a man suffering from high altitude sickness, he was asked by the suddenly very nervous officer on the spot whether the patient really was in mortal danger.

Landing sites, but no helicopters

Landing site

Although there are some helicopter landing sites on the Marangu route, they are so far only used by birds. After being transported down with the wheeled stretcher, the altitude-sick people are loaded into a jeep above Horombo Hut at 3,700 meters and driven down a dusty piste to the lowlands. Serious cases can only be treated in the University Hospital of Moshi. The transport takes a lot of time, which can decide about life or death in an extreme emergency.

Deaths are hushed up

Glacier in first daylight

About the climbers who die on Mount Kilimanjaro from high altitude sickness is only spoken behind closed doors. In the week before our arrival at the Horombo Hut two climbers had died there after their summit success, we were told. The two had gone to sleep and did not wake up again. Had they overestimated themselves and underestimated the alleged “hiking mountain”, like so many others on Kilimanjaro? I met summiteers who reached the highest point in just three (!) days. Most took five days to overcome the about 4.000 meters to the summit – to short to properly acclimatize.

Main thing: the summit certificate

Last view on Kili

Above all, I missed two things on Kilimanjaro: humility and respect. Humility before the technically easy, but nevertheless high mountain. Respect for the limits of one’s own ability to perform and the possibility of suffering from high altitude sickness. Humility before nature, which we should consider as a gift. Respect for the local guides, who have so much more Kili experience than the guests from abroad. Instead: with tunnel vision to the summit, the main thing is that the summit certificate is soon hanging on the wall.

This was all of Kilimanjaro I saw today

Kilimanjaro played hide-and-seek with me. After the long trip from Cologne via Frankfurt and Addis Ababa to Tanzania, I was looking forward to taking a look at the highest mountain of Africa from the plane. Stupidly, I was sitting in the central aisle. When the pilot announced that Kilimanjaro was now on our left, I roused my neighbor and hurried to a window at the emergency exit to take a snapshot. But I came too late. The lucky ones were able to catch at least a glimpse of the Kili. I only saw clouds.

Annoying snail’s pace

Kilimanjaro poster

After landing at Kilimanjaro Airport, there was no question of thinking of the mountain because I got a little introduction to the pitfalls of Tanzanian bureaucracy. I had to throw the prepared visa form right into the bin, because in the meantime a new one existed. The queues in front of the few counters were long. Very long. The officials behaved in a very friendly manner, but did not let themselves be disturbed and worked at such a low pace that snails would have looked like Formula One racing cars. After more than one and a half (!) hours I finally got the desired stamp in my passport.

Confiscated medicine boxes

Briefing at the hotel

The doctors of the Philipps University Marburg, who will do a study on high altitude sickness during our expedition, suffered even more. The customs officials seized without further ado three boxes with equipment for blood samples and a box of syringes. First they wanted to confiscate even the emergency backpack. Only when emergency medical doctor Christian Kreisel threatened to blame the responsible official for anything that possibly would happen on the expedition, he coughed at least the rucksack up. The four boxes are now to be released after completion of further formalities on Monday and then be brought by jeep onto the mountain.

Pre-tasting

Skoal!

This mountain also hid behind clouds as we drove from the airport to the hotel. Again no Kilimanjaro! After all, I could admire it on a poster at a gas station. And in the late afternoon, the mountain even showed a small, snow-covered corner. I celebrated this in the hotel with a “Kilimanjaro Beer”. So at least I have pre-tasted the mountain before we’ll set off tomorrow morning. Then we will ascend from Marangu Gate at 1,800 meters to the Mandara Hut at 2,700 meters.

Kilimanjaro

According to the statistics, Kilimanjaro is one of the top mountain destinations in the world. Every year tens of thousands of people tackle the highest mountain in Africa. In 2016, reportedly, more than 30,000 visitors have reached the highest point at 5,895 meters. The “Kibo” is said to be a trekking mountain, several easy routes lead to the summit. Only during the rainy seasons in April/May and October/November the tourist flow decreases a bit. Many operators offer hikes to the roof of Africa as a week trip – this short stay also ensures that the mountain is so popular. However, it is less known that every year several hundred tourists suffering seriously from high altitude sickness have to be rescued from Kilimanjaro, and about two dozens of them die, in some years even significantly more.

4000 meters up in a few days

Christian Kreisel

The Tanzanian government keeps the exact number of deaths under cover. If they became known, this could damage the booming mountain tourism. Many people simply underestimate the risk of getting altitude-sick on Kibo – though it’s actually obvious: After all, the summit aspirants have to overcome more than 4,000 meters in altitude within a few days. The physician Christian Kreisel from the University Hospital of Gießen and Marburg now wants to develop a faster and reliable diagnosis of high altitude sickness – with a study on Kilimanjaro. The tests have so far been too coarse meshed, says the 37-year-old, who has climbed the mountain already six times: “I want to reduce the mesh size of the sieve.”

Numerous tests

Kreisel is looking for 25 athletes who participate in the study – mountain bikers or mountain runners. From 24 September to 1 October 2017, they are to climb the highest peak in Africa. A three-day training camp is planned at 3,700 meters, an overnight stay at 4,800 meters and a summit attempt. Before and during the trip, numerous medical and also psychological tests will be made. At the same time, the athletes receive data on their performance at high altitude, which should also be useful for their future mountain sports projects.

“Up to now, pursing sport seriously on a mountain like Kilimanjaro was a dream limited to just a few elite athletes,“ says Rainer Braehler, organizer of the “Kilimanjaro Summit Challenge”, “but with this study, ambitious amateur athletes can now test their limits at very high altitudes – with the reassurance of full medical supervision”. Those who are interested in taking part, find the details and can apply on the website of the project.

Oswald Oelz

“I will climb until I am dead,” says Oswald Oelz, sitting opposite me recently at the International Mountain Summit in Bressanone. The 73-year-old native of Austria lives as a retiree in an old farmhouse in the Zurich Oberland region in Switzerland. “I have a farm with sheep, parrots, ducks, geese, chickens. I write, read a lot, climb. And I travel around the world.” Oswald called “Bulle” Oelz scaled Mount Everest in 1978, on the same expedition, during which Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler climbed the highest mountain on earth for the first time without bottled oxygen. Oelz succeeded first ascents in the Alps, in Alaska, Jordan and Oman. Until 2006 he worked as chief physician at the “Triemli hospital” in Zurich. The professor also researched in the field of high altitude medicine.

Oswald Oelz, you are a mountaineer and a doctor, you have got to know both worlds. Time and again, there are fatalities in the high mountains due to high altitude cerebral or pulmonary edema. Has the climbing community learned nothing over the past decades?

The climbing community has learned nothing insofar as they still climb up to altitudes where a human being doesn’t really belong. Above 5,300 meters, man is not able to survive in the long run. Nevertheless, he goes up there. This is a charm, a thrill. If he is sufficiently acclimatized, he can stay up there for a shorter or longer time. The problem is that, on the one hand, people are willing to ascent who are less fit for high altitude and, on the other hand, they climb too fast too high. The typical example is Kilimanjaro, where you climb up to almost 6,000 meters within five days or even less. There is a very high death rate. Per year about twenty so-called climbers die. That is kept strictly under lock by the government.

Oelz on the summit of Mount Everest

On Everest, reportedly two-thirds of the summit aspirants are prescribed performance enhancing drugs to increase their chances of summit success. Who is responsible for doping on the mountain, the climbers themselves or rather the doctors who hand over these drugs to them?

I have no idea to what extend climbers are doped on Everest. But I have no doubt that there are quite a lot using the “three D”: Diamox, Dexamethasone and Dexedrine. The mountaineers take Diamox for a long time, then Dexamethasone, a cortisone preparation, during the ascent and finally, to mobilize the last resources, Dextroamphetamine – a poison which was given to the Stuka pilots in the Second World War to make them more aggressive. In the history of alpinism, many climbers have died as a consequence of taking these amphetamines on Nanga Parbat and other mountains because they pushed themselves beyond their limits. Obviously this medication is prescribed by doctors. On the other hand, these drugs are also available illegally. Today you can get everything you want provided that you pay for it.

Actually, Diamox and Dexamethasone is emergency medicine.

This is certainly also a cause of the problem. I think Diamox is the most harmless of these. If someone makes this brutal ascent of Kilimanjaro within five days up and down, he is almost certainly a candidate for high altitude sickness. This can be avoided to a great extent by taking Diamox. It has few side effects. The beer tastes horrible, which is the worst side effect. You have to drink a little more water because it has a diuretic effect. But otherwise I personally recommend Diamox, if someone who wants to climb Kilimanjaro and has problems with high altitude asks me.

Climbing in Jordan

You were on top of Mount Everest in 1978, along with Reinhard Karl (Karl was the first German on Everest, he died in an ice avalanche on Cho Oyu in 1982). Four years later you suffered from a high altitude cerebral edema at Cho Oyu almost killing you. How can this be explained? You really had to assume that you can handle high altitude well.

I was not able to bear high altitude as good as, for example, Reinhold Messner but quite properly, when I had acclimatized. But I always had this time pressure. I was working in the hospital. I wanted to get as high as I could as quickly as I could in the few days I had left for mountaineering. In 1982, I had a severe high altitude cerebral edema. In 1985, on Makalu, we moved within nine days from Zurich up to 7,000 meters. There I had a life-threatening high altitude pulmonary edema. I would have died if I had not tried for the first time a therapy which then worked. I took the heart medication Nifedipine, which lowers the increased blood pressure in the pulmonary circulation, which is especially crucial in the case of a high altitude pulmonary edema. That saved my life. Afterwards I have made the appropriate studies, and we were able to prove that this drug can be used as a prophylaxis for people who are predisposed to high altitude pulmonary edema. In my opinion this isn’t doping. Furthermore we could show that in case someone is already suffering from a high altitude pulmonary edama, it can improve the situation significantly. Meanwhile, it has been found that the same effect can be achieved by Viagra. It widens the vessels also in the lungs, not just below. Thus the increased pressure in the pulmonary circulation decreases, and the people are doing better. This is, of course, more fun than taking a heart medication.

You referred to prophylaxis. Is it really practiced?

I know people who do it. In 1989, we published a work in the “New England Journal of Medicine”, the leading journal in the medical scene, in which we showed that people with a predisposition to high altitude pulmonary edema can be protected to a certain extent by prophylaxis with this cardiac medication. People who e.g. suffered from a high altitude pulmonary edema even in the Alps at an altitude of 3,000 to 3,500 meters should be recommended such a prophylaxis. Of course, it would be wiser to tell them: “Stop this stupid mountaineering, instead swim, run or whatever!” But these people are not teachable. They want some medicine.

“An embarrassing spectacle”

You had the privilege of traveling in the Himalayas at a time, when it was still a deserted mountain region without any tourism. How do you think about what is going on there today?

I follow what’s happening today in the Himalayas with fascination. It is unbelievable what the young really good climbers do in the difficult walls of the seven-thousanders. What I am following with great sadness is what takes place on Everest and on the other commercialized eight-thousanders. These endless queues of clients who are pulled up by their Sherpas – I think that’s an embarrassing spectacle.

Siegrist on the highline on Kilimanjaro

“In terms of safety a 20- or 30-meter highline is comparable with climbing in the sixth or seventh grade,” Heinz Zak told me some time ago. The extreme climber, photographer and filmmaker from Austria is a slackline pioneer in Europe and a recognized expert in balancing at dizzying heights. Highlining is very popular in the climbing scene – the Swiss top climber Stephan Siegrist is also doing it from time to time. The 43-year-old has now set a new high-altitude world record in this discipline – most likely because there are not yet record lists. On Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa, Stephen tensioned a 21-meter-long highline at an altitude of 5,700 meters between two rock towers above the “Arrow Glacier Camp” and balanced across the line in a height of about 150 meters above the ground. Until now the Hungarian Bence Kerekes was said to be the record holder, who had crossed a highline at about 5,300 meters in Indian Ladakh in 2015.

Difficult to find the right balance

Balancing in thin air is a particular challenge, says Siegrist, who had tensioned his highlines previously at Swiss mountains such as the Matterhorn (in 2012) or the Dufourspitze (in 2013): “In spite of acclimatization, it was difficult to find the balance. At this altitude everything slows down, apparently getting into balance too.” It was very tiring to get up with one leg in order to begin the crossing at all, said Stephan: “It was also interesting to see how the highline responded to the slightest tension. If I’m not fully relaxed, immediately the line is getting nervous.”

Thomas Laemmle on top of Mount Everest

He has a written proof. The China Tibet Mountaineering Association (CTMA) certificated that Thomas Laemmle reached the summit of Mount Everest without bottled oxygen on 23 May. As reported before, the German was among a handful of climbers who made it to the highest point at 8,850 meters without breathing mask this spring. “Finally, I took four breaths per step,” Thomas writes to me from Kathmandu, where he is waiting for the flight home. “But I was not at my limit. I was able to enjoy the climb, because it was almost windless and relatively warm. Unfortunately, the summit was wrapped in a cloud.”

Planned proposal

Per SMS and picture

On the top of Everest, he was even able to take off his gloves and write two SMS, says the 50-year-old. In one of them he asked his girlfriend Heike for her hand. The marriage proposal was not spontaneous but planned for a long time: “Otherwise I would not have had the sign with me.” Later Thomas took a picture of it on the highest point on earth. Actually, Laemmle had already planned to climb Cho Oyu and Everest without oxygen in 2015. “After four weeks the earthquake in Nepal put a spoke in my wheel,” writes Thomas.

Two summit attempts on Cho Oyu

Training on Kilimanjaro

This year again the sports scientist, who is living in the German town of Waldburg in Baden-Wuerttemberg, first went to Cho Oyu for acclimatization. Previously he had already breathed thin air on 5895-meter-high Kilimanjaro in March. He had reached the summit of the highest mountain in Africa three times within a week. On Cho Oyu, he made two summit attempts along with a friend, Laemmle reports. The first one on 7 May ended at 7,500 meters, the second one on 13 May in difficult conditions at 7,850 meters. “My friend was aware that we had only the first half of May for climbing Cho Oyu. I did the guiding for free.”

Terribly cold

Thomas, in the background Cho Oyu

Well-acclimatized, Thomas reached Everest Base Camp on 16 May. His plan: regeneration below 5,700 meters regenerate and then directly the summit attempt. To avoid being stuck in traffic jams on the Northeast Ridge – “About 100 climbers were waiting in the wings.” – Laemmle, in consultation with the Austrian meteorologist Charly Gabl, decided to make his final summit push on 23 May – two days after the date that most of the other mountaineers on the north side of Everest had chosen. But there were also some traffic jams on 23 May, says Thomas: “Until sunrise on the ridge at 5.30 a.m., I was terribly cold due to lack of oxygen. My boot heater was running on full blast. Then I finally found a sunlit rock on which I could wait until the jam at Second Step had dissolved.” There were two more short jams behind this key point. Finally, he reached the summit at 2 p.m. – as last climber from the north side. An hour later, Thomas started his descent.

Concern for fingers and toes

Certificate of the Tibetan Mountaineering Association

In the evening, in Camp 3 at 8,300 meters, it began to snow, and snow penetrated into the tent. “Shortly thereafter, the stove was not working any more,” says Laemmle. “I had no chance to do something against dehydration. In order to prevent a pulmonary edema, I spent the night sitting in the tent and awake.” When it got warm again the next morning, he managed to light the stove and melt snow for half a liter of water. However, because strong wind was predicted, he finally breathed bottled oxygen. “I thought the risk of frostbite due to dehydration and strong wind was too great,” writes Thomas. “I decided to use the emergency oxygen to save fingers and toes from frostbite during the descent.” At an altitude of 7,400 meters, the bottle was empty. From there, he continued to descend without supplementary oxygen again.

Not on the list

Lammle’s success will hardly be listed in Everest statistics as an ascent without bottled oxygen because he used a breathing mask on his descent. It doesn’t make any difference to Thomas. He will return home physically unharmed. And after all, he has a certificate that he made it to the summit of Mount Everest without supplementary oxygen.

Alix von Melle on Makalu

The ridge between audacity and high spirits is narrow. And it is always a question of perspective. If a climber is to explain a beach goer why he exposes himself to the risk of falling during a mountain tour, he will mostly meet with stunned disapproval. Alix von Melle will probably face those reactions if she will really set off for Tibet next spring to climb Mount Everest. Finally, Alix had to abort a summit attempt on Makalu for health grounds last May. “It was a gut feeling. I was extremely cold, and this cold came from my inside”, says the 43-year-old, who leads the ranking of German female high mountaineers, with six summit successes on eight-thousanders. With her husband Luis Stitzinger, Alix descended to their last high camp. “Then I sat in the tent and really gasped for breath like a fish out of water.” The suspicion: a high altitude pulmonary edema. Using bottled oxygen, Alix was able to reach the base camp by her own. Later pneumonia was diagnosed additionally – and asthma was involved too.

Kilimanjaro as a high-altitude-test

Alix and Luis in high camp on Makalu

“It is still not clear what exactly was the reason, probably a stupid combination of all”, says Alix. After her return to Germany, she was short of breath for weeks. Then she recovered and began to train again. In September, Alix joined a commercial expedition to the 5895-meter-high Mount Kilimanjaro that was led by Luis, and she scaled the highest mountain in Africa. “I tolerated high altitude on Kili well”, says von Melle. “I realised, everything’s allright again.” Thus she started planning her next eight-thousander-project. “It is not yet certain. But Mount Everest from the Tibetan north side belongs to most probable options”, says Alix. She and Luis are thinking about using the infrastructure of an Everest expedition operated by Amical and led by Dominik Mueller.

More attention to alarm signals

I’m surprised, I had expected that Alix would rather choose one of the “lower” eight-thousanders, due to her lung problems. Therefore I ask her: Really without breathing mask, like in her previous projects? “Definitely without bottle oxygen,” Alix  replies. “Also after our last Makalu expedition, it was out of question for us to switch to the use of supplementary oxygen and Climbing Sherpas. That is simply not our way.” The experience on Makalu has been a “small damper”, Alix admits. But she says that she has learned from it: “I have reconsidered training, diet, times for recovery. And I will focus even more on alarm signals of my body.” Even and especially on Everest. “I am clearly aware that the chance to scale Everest without supplemental oxygen is really quite low. Since everything has to fit together”, says Alix. “If I have to turn back there, I will not lose my face. We just want to try it. Maybe it works, maybe not.”