Beck Weathers – An escape from Everest

Time stranded: 2 days

Distance traveled: Under 10 miles

Terrain types: Mountain

Deaths: 1

Situation ended: Found by climbers

Location: Tibet and Nepal border, Himalayas

 Beck Weathers was a pathologist from Texas, just a normal guy who wanted to test out his adventurous side by attempting to climb the highest mountain on earth. In May of 1996 he joined an expedition to the summit of Mount Everest, led by a guide named Rob Hall from an adventure holidays company.

The initial climb went well for the most part, but when the group got closer to the summit Beck lost his vision due to the effects of high altitude and overexposure to ultraviolet light. Normally altitude blindness isn’t that common amongst most people, but Beck had recently had radial keratotomy surgery, a procedure to correct his extreme short sightedness and this left him especially sensitive to the conditions on the mountain.

Beck was already at camp 5 by the time he was almost completely blind, which was located 27,000 ft up, only 2000 ft away from the summit. Hall wanted him to remain at camp 5 with the rest of the group and the other guide while he took another member of the group to the summit, and then they would all come down together on his return.

Rob Hall and the other client died up the mountain, and since they were the only 2 who went to the top, no one knows what happened. After waiting for longer than it would have taken them to return, the other guide took Hall and the 10 other members back towards the next base camp. Beck was tied to a rope connecting him with the guide, a man named Michael Groom who was essentially his eyes, as he was still almost completely blind at this point.

While descending back down to camp 4, a blizzard hit the mountain and the group became disorientated and were unable to find the next base camp. The storm lasted for several hours and by the time it had ended, Beck and 4 other members of the group were left so weakened that the guide thought he had no choice but to press on with the more able ones and try to find help, leaving Beck and the 4 others stranded in the open.

Luckily a guide from another expedition stumbled across them and took 3 of the group to safety, but Beck and another member had wandered off from the others and got lost in the low visibility. Since the guide believed there was no way they could both survive up there, he decided it best to avoid a lengthy search and led the other members he rescued to safety.

Beck has lost sight of the other member of the group he was with, who was later found dead nearby, and found himself caught in the open during a blizzard, which he had no choice but to put up with and try and make it through the night. He spent those long dark hours in his sleeping bag, wiggled in between some rocks to try and block the wind. His face and hands were completely exposed, but since he had no idea where he was, he had no choice but to lay there and freeze.

The next morning there was a break in the weather and Becks vision had started to return. He managed to walk down to camp 4 and met some of the other members of his group there, who claimed that his frozen nose looked like it was made from porcelain. His face and hands were badly frozen, and he was so weak from the experience that his fellow members didn’t think he would live through the night.

The others in the group put him in his own tent and tried to make him as comfortable as possible, not expecting to find him alive the next day. During the night another blizzard hit and Beck, unable to eat or drink due to his frozen lips and hands, had to go through the whole night with nothing to eat or drink, as his cries for help were muffled by the storm.

After their initial surprise of finding him alive the next morning wore off, the group helped him to walk on his frozen feet down to the next base camp, where he was evacuated on one of the highest ever recorded medical evacuations ever performed by a helicopter.

Even though he survived his ordeal, he suffered greatly in the next coming days. His right arm was amputated half way down the forearm, and he lost all the fingers on his left hand. He also lost his nose and parts of both feet and some of his cheeks, but ultimately survived in the end.