The major expeditions to Mount Everest
1990 - 1999 (2)

With the major exploits on Everest virtually all accomplished, this period in the history of the giant mountain can be summarised by three main trends.

On the one hand, there has been a glut of commercial expeditions (an experienced guide handles all of the logistics for the expedition and, in theory, takes its clients to the summit) with an ever-increasing number of climbers anxious to tackle the giant's slopes! In spring 1996, the year that saw the biggest tragedy ever to occur on Everest (see below), there were no fewer than 300 clients going up or down the famous Khumbu ice waterfall. On the other, there has been an expansion in the number of theme expeditions (looking for traces of the Yeti or an expedition to find traces of the legendary British mountaineers, Mallory and Irvine, recalibrating the height of the mountain, for example) or scientific expeditions (studying the body's resistance to cold, geology, etc.)

Latest trend: realising that the slopes of the giant are becoming increasingly polluted - on the South Col, for example, it appears that the spectacle is at its worst. "Over the years," writes Joe Simpson in his book The Hidden Face (Glénat), it (the South Col) has become covered with the litter of countless expeditions: the canvas of torn tents, broken poles, empty oxygen bottles, and here and there, the bodies of unlucky mountaineers…", some climbers have had the idea of cleaning up the mountain and have organised expeditions with the specific aim of clearing the snows as much as possible of its waste. In this way, in 1994, the American climber, Scott Fisher organised an expedition that he named the "Sagarmatha Environmental Expedition"; the result was two and a half tons of rubbish being removed from the slopes of the mountain.

The tragedy of 1996. The tragedy that took place in the spring of 1996 on the slopes of the highest mountain in the world was quite dramatic and raised so many basic questions that it is worth pinning this black year down and taking the time to examine it a while. On 10th May, the roof of the world was the setting for a terrible slaughter. As they were making their way towards the summit, no fewer of than four expeditions, all of them commercial, were struck with the full force of an extremely violent storm. In less than 24 hours, eight climbers, including two well-known guides, the mountaineers Rob Hall and Scott Fisher, met their death. At the same time, others (climbers, guides and clients) were miraculously rescued. What happened in the night of 10th to 11th May 1996 will no doubt live on as one of the most dramatic pages in the story of mountaineering in the Himalayas; the public at large will also long remember the last words that Rob Hall spoke on the radio to his wife in New Zealand before dying, as he refused to come down the mountain because he had decided to go and help his clients who were in a pitiful state: "I love you. Sleep well, my darling. Please don't worry too much". This tragedy was brought to the public's knowledge both because the Imax team making the film about Everest happened to be there, and because of the books and films dedicated to it (including the bestseller "Tragedy on Everest" by John Krakauer, who was the correspondent of the American publication, Outside Magazine).

A few days later, seven other climbers perished on their way up (or down) the mountain, while on the other side of Everest, on the North Face, three Indian climbers were left for dead by another expedition - Japanese - which passed just a few metres from the dying men without offering them help. In the autumn of the same year, three climbers met their death on 25th September while making their way towards camp IV: just below the Genevan Spur, a sheet of snow suddenly broke away, sweeping away two sherpas and a French climber with it.

Of course, this cascade of tragedies raised many questions. First and foremost, there is the problem the jumble of rubbish that is increasingly soiling the slopes of Everest; during the black spring of 1996, several hundred climbers (spread across no fewer than 17 expeditions) were involved in attempting to conquer the highest mountain in the world. Then there is the question of commercial expeditions which sometimes accept inexperienced tourists, who are far from being sufficiently well prepared for this type of adventure. On this subject, harsh criticism was rained down on the head of Sandy Pittman, a mega-rich American who, according to some, was more interested in publicity than mountaineering. This is what Joanne Kaufman said about him in the Wall Street Journal: "Mrs Pittman is better known in some circles for her social climbing than for her abilities as a mountaineer. She and her husband are regulars at all the right parties and all the gossip columns in the right-wing press. A former associate of Mr Pittman who wishes to remain anonymous, stated to us: Sandy Pittman hangs on to a lot of people's coat tails. She thirsts for publicity. If she had to climb a mountain incognito, I do not believe that she would do it". Whatever the facts of the matter, Mrs Pittman had managed that spring to gain a place in Scott Fisher's team as the web correspondent for NBC Interactive Media. In her first report sent on the network, she in any event illustrates the state of mind enjoyed by this tourist-client. This is what she wrote: "My personal effects are ready... I have got as much in the way of computers and electronic hardware as I have climbing equipment: two portable microcomputers, a camcorder, three 35 mm cameras, a digital camera, two tape recorders, a CD player, a printer and a sufficient quantity (I hope) of solar panels and batteries to make the whole lot operate… I would not like to leave without taking a blend of coffee from Dean and DeKLuca, as well as my espresso machine. And because we will be on Everest for Easter, I have also taken four chocolate eggs. Hunting for Easter eggs at 5 000 metres, should be interesting…".

Finally, a last question: changes to the spirit of the mountain and the ethics of climbing, which have probably evolved greatly since the heroic post-war era. Examples of this come by the sackful. We will recall first of all the serious problems that beset Alain Hubert's expedition at the Cho Oyu base camp during his attempt to make a winter ascent via the South-East face, Nepal 1989: because of sombre stories of equipment used jointly on the rockface, Regis Mincent, the Belgian's companion, was beaten to a pulp by Korean climbers before he managed to get away, by night, with Alain, to go down the mountain at top speed and so escape their pursuers. We can also mention the attitude of the Dutch mountaineer, Ronald Naar (who has just failed in his attempt to cross the Antarctic in the footsteps of the two Belgians, Hubert and Dansercoer) who, snug in his tent on the South Col of Everest, refused to help an Indian climber who, barely a few metres away, was lying, dying, waving his arm in a final spasm of life, trying to call for assistance. In his book devoted to the question, The Hidden Face (Glénat), Joe Simpson, a writer with a passion for mountains and adventure, wrote: "There is something exasperating about all this carnage. I feel I am groping in the dark as I try to understand how the ethics of mountaineering could have fallen so low on Everest. It is dangerous to find reasons simply for the pleasure of looking for them. Climbing in the Himalayas has become a commercial business, full stop. It is now just another tourist activity. Whether you pay an agency to handle the logistics of your expedition, or whether you do it yourself. Whichever way, you always need a lot of money… I cannot get the idea out of my mind of climbers abandoned to a solitary death, without anyone there making an effort to provide comfort or help, no matter how vain that support might be. When there have been so many marvellous exploits on Everest, so many noble and selfless acts, it just takes these two dramas (here Simpson is speaking of the tragedy of 1996 and the conduct of Naar) to tarnish everything. No mountain is worth that. No human being should be able to watch such heart-rending events without feeling the compulsion to act…".