Into the Khumbu Icefall

With a four-day rotation to Camps One and Two starting tomorrow I figured I’d write a quick blog detailing yesterday’s foray into the Khumbu Icefall that will likely be similar to tomorrow’s journey (and both rotations after that). Rather than repeating the details of this section of the climb when they happen on upcoming rotations I’ll simply write it once here and reference as necessary. I’ll fill in any details that change or interesting stories that arise from those trips. For reference, the Khumbu Icefall lays between EBC and Camp 1.

My 2:00 AM alarm might as well have been silent. I was up by 1:30 and staring blankly at the roof of my tent. Even saying I was up at 1:30 is generous. For some reason, I had just managed the worst night’s sleep I can remember. It wasn’t nerves or anticipation for the next day. I simply couldn’t sleep. Having laid down around 7:30 and fallen asleep around 8:00 PM I was back wake by around 8:30. I tossed, turned, rolled, rolled again, peed, adjusted, turned, and finally gave up around 10:00 PM. I decided if I wasn’t going to sleep I might as well listen to the most recent audio book I had been hacking away at.

“Atomic Awakening” by James Mahaffey would put most people to sleep within seconds. Fortunately or unfortunately, the semi-technical talk about all the scientific discoveries and Nobel Prizes that were necessary to get us into the atomic age is just the type of thing that actually keeps me engaged. I listened until around midnight then decided some music might help me disengage and catch a couple of hours of sleep. Nope. Well at least not immediately. Two albums later at around 1 AM I finally dozed off for another 30 minutes. This brings me back to the roof of my tent and my useless alarm.

It’s not every day you get up and get ready to head up into the Khumbu Icefall. For those who may not know exactly what an icefall is, it is usually the terminus of a glacier where big chunks tend to break free and litter the terrain all around. The Khumbu Icefall is exactly this except it isn’t quite the terminus. Instead, the glacier descends several thousand feet, fed on either side by falling chunks from other glaciers, as it makes a 90-degree left-hand turn to a more gradually descending valley where it coalesces into a more solid and thin ice sheet that we set up our basecamp on. A good chunk of this (pun intended) was our goal for the day.

The team met for a quick breakfast at 2:30 followed by the dawning of and checking of harnesses and helmets. We each paired off with our climbing Sherpa and headed to the Puja alter for a last-minute bit of luck before striking off single file on the main trail through base camp. After forty minutes of walking over the rocky and icy trail and past many other camps we arrived at crampon point. We took a few minutes to strap on and secure our metal cleats, evacuate the bladders, and grab a quick bit of water before ascending into the maze of ice.

Heeding my lesson from Lobuche Peak I started off in the middle of the pack at what felt like a 60-70% pace. Despite being mentally tired from a lack of sleep my body was ready to go. We quickly came to the first fixed line the was more of a hand line than one requiring a mechanical ascender. Once we past the first anchor point we started using our safety carabiner that would prevent us from falling below the last fixed point. There were only a few short steep sections for the first 30-40 minutes but the conga line is strong in the icefall. There are a few places you can pass slower climbers who refuse to get out of the way (or who are already too mental spent to think to let faster climbers pass). My team was quite strong and it seemed as though none of us had much trouble cranking up our output level to the 90% range for a quick passing burst. Then it was quickly back to the 60-70% rhythm to catch our breath and keep up the pace.

The first ladder we encountered was a horizontal one that spanned about 10 feet. In fact, most of the horizontal ladders that I encountered the entire day were single ones that were quite easy to cross despite the seemingly bottomless blackness that filled the void below. There were only two ladder sections that needed more than one tied together. One was an almost vertical section consisting of three ladders with a pretty fun moved at the top to gain the final three feet above them and another diagonal section with two ladders tied together that wasn’t much to speak of. Above the three-ladder section the crowd seemed to thin. Passing became easier and less frequent unless you count the Sherpa carrying ridiculous loads to the higher camps who seemed to have no trouble catching and passing everybody. There was one almost vertical section of about 20 feet with good steps that required a bit of jumarring but the rest was sufficiently protected and non-threatening to get away with only using the safety carabiner.

By 5:30, another teammate and I, along with our Sherpa, pulled into a fairly flat area called the football field. We unclipped from the line, dropped our packs, and started eating and drinking. Having spent most of the past two hours with my focus on stepping, breathing, and clipping, I took a few minutes to think about the terrain we had just covered. There were huge crevasses, towering syracs (large chunks of solid glacier ice), thin ledges, and some of the most beautiful stars to faintly augment the light from headlamps. It was beautifully intense. The precariousness of the situation not lost to the awe of the surround nature.

I would have stayed to enjoy the reflection, ever increasing light, and food but I promised myself before I came on this trip that I would spend as little time as possible in this gauntlet. No more than 10 minutes after arriving I set off back down the roughly 1,500’ feet we had just climbed up. The pace going downhill was considerably faster and I could tell my Sherpa and climbing partner was pleased to be minimizing our time here. Seeing us coming, most climbers headed uphill paused to let us clip around them on the lines and take the chance to catch their breath. It was easy going but by far the most fun was the two rappels we got to do.

We were the first ones headed down the icefall that morning so the rappel lines were frozen and stiff as we worked them into our figure 8s. I went first on each one followed shortly by my Sherpa. The second rappel was parallel to the three-ladder vertical section I mentioned earlier where an enormous que had developed. My guess is that folks were waiting up to 40-50 minutes for their chance to get up and over that 30-foot wall of ice. And let me tell you, waiting that long in the dark cold of a glacier is not fun. Below this section, the two of us had passed almost all the uphill traffic so our descent was quick. We were back at crampon point by 6:30 having just descended in 50 minutes what it took about two hours to climbing. Happy to be clear of the dangers of the icefall we set off covering the approximate mile back to base camp in about 30 minutes. We beat the sun by about 20 minutes and were able to enjoy a second breakfast at 8:00 AM when the other climbers were just getting up for the day.

Author: upwithwes

A blog about going high places. View all posts by upwithwes