Everest 2024–HIgh Winds on Everest

Everest's summit is slammed by hurricane-force winds, causing most teams to hunker down or pause rotations for a few days. However, the fixed ropes have reached the South Col. China confirms it will open the Nepal border on May 7th.

This season will go down as all dressed up and nowhere to go - on both sides.

First, on the Nepal side, as of the end of April, many teams have historically completed their rotations and are going into wait mode for the ropes to reach the summit. However, it appears that only a few have completed a meaningful amount of time this year at Camp 2. A few have tagged Camp 3, but almost no team spent the night at 7000 meters. To be fair, in recent years, many teams have dropped this difficult acclimatization at C3 in favor of using copious amounts of supplemental oxygen starting lower at Camp 2.

Many teams have wrapped up their climbs on Mera, Island or Lobuche as an acclimatization activity instead of going through the Icefall one more time. These teams are returning to EBC and will make only one rotation to C2 before calling it good. Those in a rush—Flash/Speed/Rapid/Quick/Speed/Rabbit—whatever—will only go through the Icefall once on their summit push.

Sherpas from Seven Summits Treks have the fixed ropes to the South Col. With the ten-day delay in fixing the Icefall; the Nepal government approved a plan to use helicopters to fly more gear to Camp 2 to fix the route to the summit. This is not unprecedented. On April 23, 2016, summit rope fixing gear (rope, anchors, oxygen for the Sherpas above the South Col) was long-lined to Camp 1 by helicopters - all approved by the Government. It took six trips by helicopter plus a spotter in a separate helicopter to deliver the gear. No climbers or Sherpas were transported. This saved 87 Sherpa loads and potentially lives if there were another serac release or other natural disaster in the Icefall. This was a good move then, as it is today.

So, while it feels slower than usual, the teams are making the best of it. So, if the ropes reach the summit by May 10, as advertised, we can expect the usual flood of summit waves to follow quickly. First will be the super large teams like the 100s from Seven Summits Treks and many other Nepali-run teams. The Western teams will patiently wait at EBC for them to kick in steps, clear out and then take their turn. Finally, we'll see the uber–patient teams make their summit push, targeting May 19–22. Again, all of this depends on the weather.

Adrian Ballinger of Alpenglow says, "Just FYI, we got our Tibet invites and official word of the May 7 border opening. Locked and loaded!" They will cross the border along with climbers with Climbalaya and Furtenbach.

However, another commercial team has given up on climbing Everest from the Tibetan side. Makalu Extreme joined Adventure Peaks, Kobler & Partner, and Arnold Coster to switch to the Nepal side. Makalu Extreme posted this update revealing their frustration:

Not much news from the Everest 2024 climb from the Makalu Extreme team. Today our guide Dorchy and our member Pavel are in Goraksher. Work on setting up the Base Camp will begin tomorrow. I would like to remind you that our team and two tons of expedition cargo urgently left Kathmandu on April 26. The expedition was urgently shifted to Nepal due to the negligence of the Chinese authorities.

EverestEr reports in with their treatment Talley:

As of April 29, Nepal has issued 390 climbing permits for Everest to 37 teams representing 60 countries. The United States has the most climbers, with 70, followed by China with 65.

Climb On!
Alan
Memories are Everything