KATHMANDU: A Nepalese climbing guide who was missing on Mount Everest for six days and believed dead was found alive after crawling alone almost to base camp, officials said AFP on Thursday.
His wife had even started offering last rite prayers for his soul, he said. AFP in the hospital in the capital, Kathmandu, where he is recovering from “frostbite” but is conscious.
Mountaineer Dawa Sherpa, who is in his 50s and is better known as “Hillary” after the famous climber Edmund Hillary because of his experience, disappeared in the upper reaches of the world’s highest mountain in difficult conditions in the early hours of May 30.
It was found on Thursday morning near base camp by the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee (SPCC), a Nepalese team that helps establish routes on Everest and clean up remaining debris.
“He was found by an SPCC team this morning near base camp; he was crawling down,” said Pemba Sherpa of 8K Expeditions, who was overseeing search and rescue efforts. AFP.
A helicopter took him to Kathmandu, where a AFP The team watched as he was taken out on a stretcher.
“I spoke to the doctors: he has some frostbite, but otherwise he seems to be fine,” added Pemba Sherpa.
His wife Damu Sherpa said her family was delighted.
“We were very happy to hear the news, we had lost hope,” he said. “Yesterday we also started puja (death prayers).”
‘Tiger of the mountains’
Climber Chris Thrall, a former British Royal Navy, said he successfully reached the 8,849-meter (29,032-foot) summit with a Sherpa around 5 p.m. on May 29.
He posted a video message on Instagram on Wednesday mourning what he thought was the death of Dawa Sherpa.
She called him an “absolutely gentle giant of a man and a true ‘tiger of the mountains,'” in a post that assumed the worst.
Thrall described how on May 30 he had begun descending from Camp Four, about 7,950 m, and just below the low-oxygen “death zone.”
He said that as he was descending, Dawa Sherpa stopped.
“He sat down to rest with his backpack, these guys carry enormous loads,” he said.
“And I turned around and said, ‘Hillary, you okay, bro?’ He said, ‘Yes, yes, well Chris, please go, go!’ “This is nothing new, you know, I would move on and he would move on.”
As Thrall fell, he encountered a Polish climber who was struggling after running out of supplemental oxygen and had suffered frostbite.
“It had been a long road to the summit. What should have been five days to the summit and back took us 11 days, that’s how challenging the conditions were,” Thrall said.
“So, I’m going back for Sherpa, who will probably recover and be fine, like he’s done hundreds of times before?” he added.
“Or do I help my climbing partner, who’s out of oxygen, has frozen fingers, and you’re obviously never far from hypothermia up there?”
Thrall described the difficult conditions, sharing his oxygen cylinder with the Pole as they descended, and it took them 11 hours to reach Camp Three. Normally it would take two hours.
“I realized we had a really serious situation,” he said.
Search teams set out to find Dawa Sherpa, but he was not seen again until Thursday morning as he had gone down alone.
The ascent was one of the last of the season, so there were few other climbers on the summit.
At least five people have died this season: two Indians and three Nepalese climbers who were participating in preparations for Everest.
More than 1,000 climbers reached the summit of Everest this season, according to initial counts by Nepalese officials, making it the busiest season ever recorded.
