The summit

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The summit (original title: The Climb - Tragic Ambitions on Everest ) is a factual report about the disaster on Mount Everest in 1996, which the Russian mountaineer Anatoli Nikolajewitsch Bukrejew (in English also Anatoli Boukreev ) in collaboration with the American journalist G. Weston DeWalt published. The book can be seen as a counter-statement to the book In icy Heights by the American journalist Jon Krakauer , in which Bukreev's role as a mountain guide is heavily criticized.

Shortly after his book was published, Bukreev died on December 25, 1997 in an avalanche accident on the Annapurna .

background

In 1996, the Russian extreme mountaineer Anatoly Bukrejew took part in an expedition to the summit of Mount Everest as a paid mountain guide for the American company Mountain Madness. During the climb to the summit, several mountaineers from various expeditions lose their lives after a sudden change in weather due to freezing, exhaustion and falls. Bukreev led several completely exhausted expedition members who had got lost in the snowstorm and at night and had to bivouac in the open air in storms and temperatures of minus 40 degrees Celsius , despite the previous effort of his summit climb, back to camp 4, and thus saved at least three people Lives that would otherwise be disoriented and frozen to death without protection, food, water and oxygen. Of the six people who got lost on the descent on the South Col and missed Camp 4, five were rescued, at least three mainly through Bukreev's efforts. For his selfless rescue mission, Bukrejew - together with Peter Athans and Todd Burleson - was awarded the David Sowles Award , the highest honor awarded by the American Alpine Club at irregular intervals .

(→ Main article: Accident on Mount Everest (1996) )

literature

  • Boukreev, Anatoli; G. Weston Dewalt: The summit: Tragedy on Mount Everest , Wilhelm Heyne Verlag, Munich, 1998. ISBN 978-3-453-40569-1
  • Krakauer, Jon: To Icy Heights: The Drama on Mount Everest . Piper Verlag, Munich, 1998. ISBN 978-3-492-22970-8