Everest 2021: Weekend Update May 15, 2021

The Podcast on alanarnette.com

It was a big week of news on Everest this past week from clients summiting to a major operator canceling their expedition. This next week looks to be even bigger with 300 people trying to summit beginning May 19. I estimate 172 summits last week on May 11, 12, and 13. The jet stream was south of Everest thus the conditions were about as good as it gets on this high peak. However as the jet moved north, the winds picked back up, and teams that were hoping to squeeze a summit bid in before it hit with gale-level gusts, found it too windy even at Camp 3 to continue. The big news of the week was on Saturday, May 15 when Austrian operator, Lukas Furtenbach, told his entire team that he was canceling their expedition due to an "out of control situation at Everest Base Camp." Furtenbach was one of the few operators who imposed stringent controls over his base camp to minimize the impact of COVID-19. He brought hundreds of test kits, hired a team doctor, and limited any exposure with anyone outside his team, including his Sherpas, cooks, and other base camp staff. Yet, he still felt the risks were too high for his 20 customers, 4 mountain guides, and 27 Sherpas. His entire team had completed their acclimatization and were waiting for the winds to recede for their summit attempt. He said. "With some teams, elementary precautionary measures were simply not observed. There were meetings between the teams, there were celebrations, parties were held."

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