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Team Decides to Forego Upper Mountain Climb on Cho Oyu

Posted by: | October 01, 2010
Categories: *Expedition Dispatches *Cho Oyu
Elevation: 18,500 ft.

Hey RMI and everybody back home. This is Casey checking in from the Cho Oyu Expedition.

Just wanted to let everyone know that today we officially decided to pull the plug and not continue to climb on the upper mountain. The snow conditions continue to exist. It’s a relatively high level of avalanche hazard as well as no one has been on the upper mountain in the last few days. We are certainly not going to be the first team to be up there and stick our necks out. Add that to the forecast that we have, which is some high winds and cold temperatures as the jet stream approaches and we are actually even seeing that today with some winds and some clouds building. The majority of the expeditions here have all packed up and are heading home currently. There are a few individuals left that may stick their necks out and give it a shot, but again, we think that it is foolish for our team to take that risk.

Everyone’s doing great. Today we actually hiked up to Camp 1 and picked up most of our gear that we had left there. We got the majority of that stuff back to Advanced Basecamp here. Our plan is to relax here for the next day and then our yaks come in on the 3rd to pick up all of our loads to carry that stuff back to the main road, which is about a day-and-a-half trek. Our plan is to leave on the 3rd and try to get to the road and hopefully catch a ride on the 4th. Then we’ll drive from Basecamp to Zangmu, on the border of Tibet and Nepal. Our plan then on the 5th is to possibly arrive in Kathmandu if everything goes well.

I’m happy that everyone feels good with our decision and we look forward to coming home and seeing everybody and telling you all about our adventure. Thanks a lot you guys.

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