NFB 2001 Everest Expedition (P. V. Scaturro May 17, 2001)

EVEREST LIVE

Thursday, May 17, 2001

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

3:00 PM Nepal Time, NFB Everest Base Camp

Never one to jump those last few rungs, Jeff concentrates on foot placement on the last rung of a quadruple ladder crossing in the western cwm. Photo by Didrik Johnck.

Today was a rest day for all 13 members of the expedition. The weather was beautiful all day with only slightly overcast skies and light winds at Base Camp. All team members spent the day relaxing, answering e-mail, bathing, reading and relaxing in their tents. Steve Gipe is still at Camp 2. He informed us by radio that he has been enjoying the quiet and solitude at camp 2 and was happy to be alone for a few days.

As predicted, the weather up on the mountain was not as good as here at Base Camp. The Chilean and Spanish Everest Expeditions attempted to climb from Camp 3 to the South Col this morning and we just heard a little while ago that part of their team was forced back to Camp 3 due to very high winds. We also heard that there will be several more groups starting their summit attempts tomorrow and Saturday. This is good and bad news. The good news is that it will be great to have some teams pushing the route to the South Col and the summit ahead of us. The bad news is that it looks as if there will be a bunch of teams attempting their summit push between May 23 and 25.

Jeff and Luis navigate the semi-truck swallowing crevasses in the Western Cwm. Photo by Didrik Johnck.

This is the same time period in which we will be attempting ours. Hopefully this will not cause congestion at the Hillary step and above. Several other expeditions have started packing up and going home. The reasons range from a bad weather forecast for the rest of the climbing season to people just being burned out from several months at Base Camp.

We're staying.

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