The Edmund Hillary
story !
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The ‘Goddess Mother of the World’ … that’s what the Tibetan
people called this highest of Earth’s mountains. Everest … 29,028 feet
high (8848 metres) …rises triumphant
among the other vast mountain peaks
that comprise the Himalayas.
South of this towering monolith
lies the mysterious land of Nepal, so long closed to the Westerner. Likewise
Tibet, north of Mount Everest, had for long
kept from its borders any unwelcome ‘foreigners’.
But now, high on the south-east ridge, we
see two men ready to make a do-or-die attempt to place their feet where no
human being has ever stood. It is May 29th. 1953 and their goal is the summit of Mount
Everest ..….
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EARLY ATTEMPTS
Fifteen thousand feet below and twelve miles away Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing could see the old monastery of Thyanboche. It was there , in what is thought to be the highest monastery in the world , the team of dedicated mountaineers had begun to acclimatize themselves for the last stage of their daring venture.
Tibet had finally granted permission in December of 1920 for such an expedition. The following year George Mallory and his British team sought to conquer this stone giant. Success eluded them. In 1924 another attempt took place and this time 37 year old Mallory and fellow mountaineer, Andrew Irvine, disappeared in the treacherous terrain. Their bodies have never been discovered.
Others, however, took up the challenge.
Eric Shipton led an expedition in 1935. Swiss and French and American teams sought fame by trying to scale Mount Everest. To no avail.
In 1951 Eric Shipton is there once more, this time tackling the seemingly impossible from the mountain’s southern side rather than from Tibet. In that adventurous group was a young New Zealander named Edmund Hillary ….
But again the weather and a thousand other difficulties drove them back before their goal was reached. The ‘ Goddess of the Mountain’ remained unconquered……
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ANOTHER ATTEMPT
It was September 1952 when forty-two year old, Colonel John Hunt, was chosen to assemble a team that would make yet another attempt on this unconquered mount. Twelve men were enlisted for the task including a doctor, a scientist and a cameraman.
In his interesting volume, The Ascent of Everest, he
wrote how the equipment must be carefully chosen and thoroughly tested and how “provisions
need to be calculated for the whole period of your absence from civilization.”
It was, he adds, “a tough assignment.” (p.26)
And that was just the planning before the actual climb !
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John Hunt had been born in India, his father being an officer in
the British army. Years later, back in
England, he followed the family tradition, entered military academy, was
awarded the Sword of Honour and “was commissioned to the fashionable
Rifle Brigade and posted to India.”
But it is interesting to read, “ he was not happy with
the Army officer’s life of polo,
cocktail parties and gossip… he had a sense of social responsibility combined
with a strong Christian belief.”
(Bonnington p. 193)
And he knew a certain Sherpa (a people who live in North/East Nepal ) named Tenzing who just the previous year had accompanied a Swiss mountain climber to within a thousand feet of the summit.
This would be the fellow to organize a team of 350 other Sherpas, men who would carry food and equipment for the long trek from Katmandu to Thyanboche and even to the base of Everest.
……………………………….
One can imagine some of the feelings
that were solemnly impressed upon this band of climbers as they neared their
goal.
Would this expedition end in defeat as
had all previous ones ?
Would there be harmony or personality
clashes among the carefully chosen team?
Was the weather going to prove
friendly or hostile as they attempted to reach the ‘top of the world’?
Was the equipment the most suitable to
triumph over the hazardous conditions that would surely face them?
And would they all come back …alive?
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CLIMBING
Eventually an advance party established camp at 18,000 feet and there it was the rest of the team joined them. Now the mighty Everest loomed above them. Plotting the best route up that treacherous mountain side seemed impossible. “The shape of the ice-fall ( like a giant frozen waterfall) changes so rapidly …” (Davidson p.20) There are massive crevasses “which change shape” and seracs – towers of unsafe ice – that often topple unexpectedly and come crashing down the ice-fall. And there was the unpredictable dangers of avalanches and blizzards.
But onward, upward, the expedition made their torturous way, cutting a staircase into the ice, using ladders to cross a crack in a frozen glacier, encountering blinding snowfalls that cut visibility to zero, camping overnight and then pressing on again at daybreak.
Seven days later they had set up camp Number Three at 20,000 feet.
Before them lay what is called the Western Cwm – a ‘cwm’ being an enclosed valley on the side of a hill.’ This one was two miles long and a mile wide “split by crevasses and bombarded by avalanches.” Still they continued the ascent, ever upward over this most perilous of terrains.
By May 21 they had pitched camp Number Eight. The summit was now 3,000 feet above them.
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Pitching tents in blizzard conditions was no easy feat. Nor was the actual ‘bedding down’ for the night !
Hillary describes the scene … “ I decided, somewhat reluctantly, to sleep between Tenzing and the other wall of the tent, so after I’d inflated my air-mattress – nearly knocking over the cooker in the process – I pushed it down into the minute space still left for me. Leaving all my clothes on I wriggled down inside the sleeping bag, and then collapsed panting furiously after the effort.” (High Adventure p.192) After a snack of biscuits, jam, honey, sardines, chocolate and hot soup they “blew out the candle … and sought to sleep. I could hear the wind roaring menacingly as it flowed in a mighty unrelenting stream over the inhospitable wastes … our tent was flapping in a tormented fury and seeking to wrench itself from its moorings.” (p.193)
But survive the night they did and next morning Hunt planned that two members of the team, Charles Evans and Tom Bourdillon, attempt to reach the summit. It was May 26.
But in spite of the fact they reached 28,700 feet – higher than man had ever reached before – the summit eluded them. “Hampered by trouble with their oxygen equipment” and after some “hesitation and argument” Evans and Bourdillon returned to camp.
VICTORY
!!
Meanwhile Hillary and Tenzing established camp Number Nine – closer still to that ever-elusive goal. They slept there … and by 6:30 next morning ( May 29) the conquest of the Mountain Goddess was under way !
But a cliff 40 feet high of smooth, solid rock barred their progress. “It was,” Hillary writes, “ a major problem.” But a little to the left he espies “a great ice cornice hanging over the mighty Kanshung face. Under the effect of gravity the ice had broken away from the rock and a narrow crack ran upwards. I wondered if the cornice might collapse under my pressure. There was only one way to find out …” (View from Summit . p. 14)
He tells how he crawled inside the
fissure and “wriggled and jammed
my way to the top. Lying there panting I felt a glow of triumph – maybe we were
going to make it after all ! Tenzing slowly joined me and we moved on…”
(
Two Generations p.27-28)
Two more hours passed. And then ….the summit !!
Mount Everest was conquered!
……………………………….
Tenzing dug a hole in the snow-capped
peak and in it placed “some biscuits, a piece of chocolate
and a few sweets.” It was an
offering to the gods which dwell there according to the Sherpas’
belief. And that act reminded
Hillary that John Hunt had given him “ a little cross” to also bury there. (High Adventure p. 241 ;
View from Summit p. 16)
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AFTERMATH .
In the years that followed other expeditions have achieved victory over earth’s highest peak. … a group of Chinese climbers in 1960 … an American team in 1963.
In 1975 Junko Tubei from Japan became the first woman to stand upon the summit of Mount Everest. And the same year saw Chris Bonnington and his fellow mountaineers achieve this task. Reinhold Bonner, an Austrian, scaled this mountain in 1980 … without oxygen …alone ! (Davidson. P.28)
Thus the skill of man in achieving the seemingly impossible continues as the years roll by.
Effective planning, first-rate equipment,
team-work, skilled leadership, courageous determination … these were but some of the factors so
vital to the success of Hillary and Tenzing.
What was it Hunt had written ? … “ The success of your mission
depends primarily on the human factor on the joint effort of every man in
your team, and failure - moral or
physical – by even one or two of these would add immensely to its difficulties.”
( p.25)
And these are factors to remember in the quest for successful achievement …even today.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
Hillary E. (a) VIEW FROM THE SUMMIT Doubleday Pub. 1988 h/cover . 310pp.
Hillary E. (b) HIGH ADVENTURE Readers Book Club 1955
h/cover 256pp.
Hillary E. (c ) FROM THE
OCEAN TO THE SKY Viking Press 1979 h/cover 268pp.
Hillary E. (d) TWO GENERATIONS Hodder & Stoughton 1984 h/cover 222pp.
Hunt J. THE ASCENT OF EVEREST Hodder &
Stoughton 1953 h/cover 328pp.
Bonnington C. QUEST FOR
ADVENTURE C.Potter Pub. 1981 h/cover
448pp.
Clarke C. EVEREST
Sackett & Marshall 1978
h/cover 62pp.
Davidson B. HILLARY & TENZING CLIMB EVEREST 1953
Zoe Books h/cov. 32pp.
Internet articles .
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