K2_ Life and Death on the World's Most Dangerous Mountain - Ed Viesturs [147]
The pair finally bivouacked in a hollow snow niche they excavated out of the slope, at 27,500 feet. Since they had left their rucksack anchored to a piton at the top of the traverse out of the Bottleneck, they did not even have the space blanket Diemberger had stuck in his pack as an emergency shelter. It was a blessing that the storm held off until morning, but in the night both climbers suffered serious frostbite. At first light on August 5, in a whiteout, the two started down again, but they were effectively lost. Zigzagging back and forth, they finally struck the Korean fixed ropes and managed to get down the Bottleneck; in the mist, however, they could not locate Camp IV. Diemberger began shouting, and at last Bauer heard his cries and shouted back, guiding the two stricken climbers into camp.
Bauer later reported that he had dragged Tullis on her back the last stretch into camp, that “her nose and cheeks [were] quite black showing definite signs of first degree frostbite,” and that her gloveless “right hand [was] swollen and bits of flesh [were] hanging down.” In The Endless Knot, Diemberger vehemently disputed these assertions, insisting that Tullis had made it into camp under her own power.
In any case, Bauer and Imitzer took Tullis into their tent, the largest of the three at Camp IV, fed her hot drinks, and tried to warm her with a spare down jacket. Eventually she returned to the tent she and Diemberger had pitched on the Shoulder on August 2.
Five of the seven climbers ensconced in Camp IV had reached the summit. To avert catastrophe, all they needed to do now was head down the mountain, following a route that was hung with fixed ropes most of the way. But the looming storm had finally arrived. The climbers stayed in their tents all through August 5. They would not try to descend, in fact, for another five days.
At base camp, Jim Curran and the other watchers could only guess what was happening high on the mountain, for there was no radio in Camp IV. In the storm, it would not be possible to climb up the Abruzzi Ridge to attempt a rescue, and as day succeeded day, the thoughts of those below turned dark. On August 5 and 7, there were lulls in the storm. On the latter day, Curran could see all the way up to the Shoulder. He said to the others in base camp, “If anyone is up, they will be, I imagine, hot-footing it down.” But no one arrived that day, or the next, or the next.
What happened at Camp IV from August 5 to 10 is still something of a mystery. Al Rouse, who had been the strongest of all seven climbers on summit day, had repeatedly vowed that one must spend as few days as possible at 26,000 feet. It seems that a kind of apathy took hold, the inevitable concomitant of the hypoxic states that perhaps all seven had entered on August 4; and that apathy most likely was reinforced by the complete exhaustion of Tullis and Diemberger.
On the night of August 5, winds that Diemberger estimated at sixty miles an hour piled heavy drifts of snow against the walls of the tent he shared with Tullis, threatening to break the poles. The Austrian was incapable of punching his way loose from inside, and by now Tullis was snowblind as well as shivering with cold. In the morning, the two called out for help. First Rouse, then Bauer tried to dig the tent loose from outside, before giving up in the blizzard. Their furious ice ax blows tore holes in the tent fabric, however, forcing Tullis and Diemberger to abandon their shelter.
Dashing through the storm, Tullis tumbled into the Austrian tent, while Diemberger crawled inside Rouse’s. The man who had refused to share his tent with the refugees on August 2 and 3 now had to beg, “Please, let me in!” Without hesitation, Rouse and Bauer granted the same mercy Diemberger had denied others. But now the misery of overcrowded