EVEREST LIVE

May 8, 2001

From: P.V. Scaturro
NFB 2001 Everest Expedition Leader

Erik sharpens his crampons to pass the time. Photo Didrik Johnck.

The team celebrates Jeff's birthday with chocolate and vanilla cakes.Photo Kim Johnson.


Chris cuts up the 200 meter spools of rope into shorter rope lengths. Photo Didrik Johnck.

I just received a radio call from Kami Tenzing, our expedition Sirdar, from Camp 2 at 21,000 feet. He and six of our Sherpas just returned from the South Col, Camp 4 at 26,000 feet. They carried all of the rope and equipment required to fix the route from the South Col to the Balcony at 27,500 feet. Three of our Sherpas, Ang Pasang, Chuldim, and Pasang Sona, are spending the night at the South Col and will fix the route tomorrow morning before returning to Camp 2. If all goes well then we will have our South Col Camp fully set up by Thursday, May 10 for our summit attempt. Due to bad weather we have been postponing our summit attempt day by day because we have been unable to get all of our equipment, primarily tents and oxygen, up to the South Col. Hopefully all of this is behind us. The bad news is that we have had a bout of intestinal illness going through our team during the last three days. So far Didrik, and Mike Brown have been taken ill and are recovering. This morning Steve Gipe, our team doctor, and Erik Weihenmayer became ill and are currently sleeping and on medication. Fortunately, it appears that the illness lasts less than 48 hours. We were scheduled to depart Base Camp for a summit attempt tomorrow morning. If Erik remains ill through tonight we will postpone by one day our summit attempt. We will keep you updated on the commencement of our summit attempt.

The weather situation has improved considerably during the last several days. As expected, May has brought us reduced winds and warmer temperatures. We have been monitoring the daily weather reports and will time our summit attempt based on the reports we have been receiving. All of our expedition members would like to thank our newest sponsor, Wilkins Weather Technology for the detailed custom weather reports they are sending us on a daily basis. This will help us monitor the jet stream winds up near the summit of Mt. Everest at 29,000 ft (8840 m) and hopefully prevent us from attempting a summit bid in impossible winds.