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Anatoli Boukreev

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Anatoli Nikoliavich Boukreev (January 16, 1958 - December 25, 1997) was a Russian climber who made seven ascents of 8,000 metre peaks without supplemental oxygen. Boukreev was relatively unknown, though well accomplished, in the international climbing community until the 1996 spring climbing season on Mount Everest, where twelve people died in one of the biggest tragedies in the climbing history of Mount Everest, an event chronicled by Anatoli Boukreev in his best-selling book The Climb.

Boukreev was born on January 16, 1958 in the Urals of Russia. After completing high school in 1975, he attended Chelabinsk University for Pedagogy in Russia where he majored in physics, and earned his Bachelor of Science degree in 1979. At the same time, he also completed a coaching program for cross-country skiing.

Contents

[edit] Climbing accomplishments

The major highlights of Boukreev's climbing career are as follows:

  • 1991
    • October 7 Mt. Everest - South Col route
    • May 10 Dhaulagiri - new route on the west wall
  • 1990
    • May Mt. McKinley - West Rib route
    • April Mt. McKinley - Cassin Ridge route

[edit] Everest 1996

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Boukreev was the lead climbing guide for the Mountain Madness expedition headed by Scott Fischer. The expedition had eight clients whom each had paid somewhere in the vicinity of $65,000 USD for a fully guided summit attempt of Mt. Everest:

  • Martin Adams (47)¹ - had climbed Aconcagua, Denali, Kilimanjaro
  • Charlotte Fox (38) - had climbed all 54 14,000' peaks in Colorado and two 8,000m peaks
  • Lene Gammelgaard (35) - accomplished mountaineer
  • Dale Kruse (45) - personal friend of Fischer for many years, first to sign up
  • Tim Madsen (33) - little experience at high altitude, lots on lower peaks; convinced by his girlfriend, Fox, to join
  • Sandy Hill Pittman (41) - New York socialite looking to complete the Seven Summits
  • Pete Schoening (68) - he had been part of a 1953 summit attempt on K2 (yet unclimbed at the time). They turned back to save the life of a climber who had developed a blood clot. On the descent, Schoening likely saved the lives of five other climbers by a spectacular ice axe arrest when climbers began falling off, after one of them lost his balance.
  • Klev Schoening (38) - Pete's nephew; former US national downhill ski racer, no 8,000m experience

¹All ages given relative to 1996.

By May 5, Pete Schoening had decided not to make the final push to the summit while still at Everest base camp. The team began the final assault on the summit by leaving base camp on May 6 with the plan to bypass Camp I and stop at Camp II for the night. However, when Boukreev reached Camp I, he found Dale Kruse in bad shape in one of the tents. Kruse was hoping to rest up, possibly spending the night there instead of going up to Camp II as planned. When Boukreev reached Camp II, he reported Kruse's condition to Fischer and Fischer decided that Kruse had to go down. So Fischer descended to Camp I and took Kruse back down to Base Camp. Boukreev had offered to take Kruse down, but Fischer preferred to do it himself since Kruse was a personal friend.

Starting around midnight on May 10, Boukreev, Neil Beidleman (guide), Scott Fischer and Sherpas began guiding the six remaining clients to the summit, starting from Camp IV on the South Col (7,900m/25,900'). Boukreev, Beidleman and all six clients eventually reached the summit, but much later than the typical safe turnaround time (around 2pm). Unnecessary delays at the South Summit, caused by fixed ropes not being setup by the climbing Sherpas by the time the team had reached that point, cost the team more than one hour of daylight. Boukreev descended to Camp IV ahead of the other climbers for reasons which are disputed.[1] The storm that rolled in caused many difficulties on the descent, resulting in several climbers getting lost and well off the normal descent route. All of the Mountain Madness clients and guides except for Martin Adams and Boukreev, and Beck Weathers, Yasuko Namba, and Mike Groom from Adventure Consultants (another expedition) were trapped, unable to determine where Camp IV was. They were forced to stay out there for hours, waiting for a break in the storm. When the break came, Beidleman and Groom managed to reach Camp IV and tell the others about the trapped clients. Boukreev, well rested, located and brought back all the climbers except for Namba and Weathers.

Fischer did not reach the summit until 3:45pm on May 10. Fischer was feeling ill (possibly suffering from HACE) and had totally exhausted himself on the ascent. He was unable to descend below the South Summit (8,350m/27,395') due to his condition and the storm that had rolled in. On May 11, Boukreev made a solo rescue attempt but found Fischer's nearly frozen body at around 7pm. A memorial cairn for Fischer is located on the crest of a hill near Lobuche.

In January 1997, Boukreev gave his expedition logs, personal journals, letters and memories to Gary Weston DeWalt, who then collected all the information into a book called The Climb. Some of the facts provided in this book differ with the accounts offered in Jon Krakauer's book Into Thin Air. The Climb was also a response to some of the accusations made by Krakauer in his book concerning the decisions and actions by Boukreev — e.g., to descend to Camp IV before the clients.

On December 6, 1997, Todd Burleson, Pete Athans, and Boukreev were awarded the David A. Sowles Memorial Award by the American Alpine Club for their heroism and devotion in rescuing four lost climbers during this expedition. This award is the Alpine Club's highest award for valor, other recipients have included Ed Viesturs and Ed Webster.

[edit] Annapurna 1997

In the winter of 1997, Boukreev was attempting to climb the south face of Annapurna I (8,078m) along with Simone Moro, an accomplished Italian mountaineer. They were accompanied by Dimitri Sobolev, a cinematographer from Kazakhstan, who was documenting the attempt. On December 25 around noon, Boukreev and Moro were fixing ropes in a couloir at around the 5,700m (18,700') level. Suddenly, a cornice broke loose from a ridge not visible from the climbing route. The resulting avalanche knocked Moro down the mountain where he landed just above their tent at Camp I (5,200m/17,060'). Fortuitously, Moro had somehow stayed near the top of the avalanche debris and managed to dig himself out after a few minutes. Unable to see or hear any signs of Boukreev or Sobolev, Moro descended to Annapurna base camp where he was flown by helicopter back to Kathmandu for surgery on his hands, which had been ripped down to the tendons during the fall.

News of the accident reached New Mexico on December 26. Linda Wylie, Boukreev's girlfriend, left for Nepal on December 28. Several attempts were made to reach the avalanche site by helicopter but inclement weather in late December prevented search teams from reaching Camp I. There was some hope that perhaps Boukreev and Sobolev had managed to reach Camp I. However, on January 3, 1998, searchers were finally able to reach Camp I and an empty tent. Linda Wylie subsequently issued a somber statement from Kathmandu:

"This is the end... there are no hopes of finding him alive."

At the site of Annapurna base-camp there is a memorial to Bourkeev including a quotation of his:

"Mountains are not Stadiums where I satisfy my ambition to achieve, they are the cathedrals where I practice my religion."

[edit] Reference

The Climb: Tragic Ambitions on Everest by Anatoli Boukreev and Gary Weston DeWalt, published by St. Martins Paperbacks, 1997, ISBN 0-312-96533-8.

Above the Clouds: The Diaries of a High-Altitude Mountaineer by Anatoli Boukreev and Linda Wylie, published by St. Martin's Griffin, 2002, ISBN 0-312-29137-X.

[edit] External links

[edit] See also

ru:Букреев, Анатолий Николаевич

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