Anatoli Boukreev

Anatoli Nikoliavich Boukreev, _ru. Анато́лий Никола́евич Букре́ев, (January 16, 1958 - December 25, 1997) was a Russian (USSR/Kazakhstan) climber who made seven ascents of 8,000 metre peaks without supplemental oxygen. The direct transliteration of his Russian name is Anatoly Nikolayevich Bukreyev.

Boukreev was relatively unknown, though well accomplished, in the international climbing community until the 1996 spring climbing season on Mount Everest, when twelve people died in one of the biggest tragedies in the climbing history of Mount Everest. The event was chronicled in the best-selling books "The Climb" by Boukreev and "Into Thin Air" by Jon Krakauer (among others).

Biography

Boukreev was born on January 16, 1958 in the southern Ural Mountains in the Soviet Union. After completing high school in 1975, he attended Chelyabinsk University for Pedagogy in the Russian SFSR, 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.

After graduation, the 21-year-old dreamed of real mountains. Boukreev moved to Alma-Ata, the capital of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic located at ridge Tian Shan. Since 1985 supporting a combined team of Kazakhstan on mountaineering, in 1991 after the breakup of the USSR he accepted Kazakhstan Republic citizenship.

Picture: Anatoli Boukreev (left) and Martin Adams with Kazakhstan state flag on Everest 1996 - [http://old.risk.ru/rus/pics/people/boukreev/galery/big_3.jpg]

Climbing accomplishments

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

*1987
**Lenin Peak (7,137 m)- First solo ascent

*1989
**April 15 Kanchenjunga (8,556 m) - new route with Second Soviet Himalaya Expedition
**April 30 - May 2 Kanchenjunga - first traverse of the four 8,000 m summits of the massif

*1990
**April Mount McKinley - Cassin Ridge route
**May Mount McKinley - West Rib route

*1991
**May 10 Dhaulagiri - new route on the west wall with First Kazakhstan Himalaya Expedition
**October 7 Mount Everest - South Col route

*1993
**May 14 Mount McKinley (6,193 m)
**July 30 K2 (8,611 m)

*1994
**April 29 Makalu II (8,460 m)
**May 15 Makalu (8,476 m)

*1995
**May 17 Mount Everest - North Ridge route
**June 30 Peak Abai (4,010 m) - guide for President of Kazakhstan
**October 8 Dhaulagiri (8,176 m) - fastest ascent record (17h 15m)
**December 8 Manaslu (8,156 m) with Second Kazakhstan Himalaya Expedition

*1996
**May 10 Mount Everest - South Col route
**May 17 Lhotse - solo ascent, speed record
**September 25 Cho Oyu (8,201 m) with Third Kazakhstan Himalaya Expedition
**October 9 North summit of Shishapangma (8,008 m)

*1997
**April 24 Mount Everest (8,850 m)
**May 23 Lhotse (8,501 m)
**July 7 Broad Peak (8,047 m) - solo ascent
**July 14 Gasherbrum II (8,035 m) - solo ascent

Everest 1996

::"See main article" 1996 Everest Disaster

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

* Martin Adams (47)¹ - had climbed Aconcagua, Denali, Kilimanjaro
* Charlotte Fox (38) - had climbed all 54 4200 m peaks in Colorado and two 8000 m peaks
* Lene Gammelgaard (35) - accomplished mountaineer. First Danish woman on Mount Everest.
* Dale Kruse (45) - personal friend of Fischer for many years, first to sign up
* Tim Madsen (33) - climbed extensively in Colorado and Canadian Rockies, little experience of 8000 m peaks
* Sandy Hill Pittman (41) - had climbed six of the Seven Summits
* Pete Schoening (68) - one of the first Americans to climb Mount Vinson and Gasherbrum I
* Klev Schoening (38) - Pete's nephew; former US national downhill ski racer, no 8000 m experience¹All ages given relative to 1996.

Pete Schoening had decided not to make the final push to the summit while still at Everest Base Camp. The team began the assault on the summit on May 6, planning to bypass Camp I and stop at Camp II for the night. However, when the guides reached Camp I, they found Kruse suffering from altitude sickness and possible cerebral edema in one of the tents. Kruse returned to Base Camp with Fischer for treatment.

Starting around midnight on May 10, Boukreev, Neil Beidleman, Scott Fischer and a team of Sherpas began guiding the six remaining clients to the summit, starting from Camp IV on the South Col (7,900 m/25,900 ft). Delays at the South Summit, caused by the failure of the climbing Sherpas to set the fixed ropes by the time the team reached that point, cost the team an hour on the ascent.

Climbing without supplementary oxygen, Boukreev reached the summit at 1:07 pm. He began his descent to Camp IV at 2:30 pm. By that time, Adams and Klev Schoening had summited, but Beidleman and the remaining four clients had not yet arrived. Boukreev recorded that he reached Camp IV by 5:00 pm. The reasons for Boukreev's decision to descend ahead of his clients are disputed. [ [http://www.salon.com/wlust/feature/1998/08/cov_03feature.html Salon Wanderlust | Coming down ] ] Boukreev maintained that he wanted to be ready to assist struggling clients farther down the slope, and to retrieve hot tea and extra oxygen if necessary. [ [http://outside.away.com/peaks/fischer/anatoli.html Summit Journal '96: Scott Fischer Returns to Everest: Anatoli Boukreev response ] ] Journalist Jon Krakauer, who climbed with the Adventure Consultants expedition, asserts that Boukreev's refusal to use supplementary oxygen and lack of warm clothing made it too dangerous for him to wait at the summit for the remaining clients. [ [http://outside.away.com/peaks/fischer/krakreply1.html Summit Journal '96: Scott Fischer Returns to Everest: Reply from Jon Krakauer ] ]

A blizzard struck at 4:00 pm, causing difficulties for the descending team members. The snow buried the fixed ropes and obliterated the trail that the team had broken on the ascent, resulting in several climbers getting lost on the South Col. Beidleman, Schoening, Fox, Madsen, Pittman, and Gammelgaard, along with Adventure Consultants' Mike Groom, Beck Weathers, and Yasuko Namba, wandered in the blizzard until midnight. When they could no longer walk, they huddled some 20 m from a dropoff of the Kangshung Face.

Near midnight, the blizzard cleared enough for the team to see Camp IV, some 200 m away. Beidleman, Groom, Schoening, and Gammelgaard set off to find help. Madsen and Fox remained with the group to shout for the rescuers. Weathers got separated from the group. Boukreev located the climbers and first brought Pittman to safety, followed by Fox and Madsen. He was not able to go back a third time for Namba.

Fischer, meanwhile, had not reached the summit until 3:45 pm. He was ill, possibly suffering from HACE, and exhausted from the ascent. Fischer was unable to descend below the South Summit (8350 m/ 27395 ft) in the storm. The following day, the climbing Sherpas located Fischer, but his condition had deteriorated so much that they were only able to give palliative care. Boukreev made three subsequent rescue attempts, but found Fischer's frozen body at around 7pm.

In January 1997, Boukreev gave his expedition logs, personal journals, letters and an oral history to Gary Weston DeWalt, who consolidated all the information into a book called "The Climb". Boukreev's account of the 1996 expedition differs in many respects from those offered in Krakauer's "Into Thin Air", Weathers' "Left for Dead", Gammelgaard's "Climbing High", and Dickinson's "The Other Side of Everest". "The Climb" was also intended as a response to Krakauer's published criticisms of Boukreev's conduct as a guide.

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 is the Alpine Club's most prestigious award; other recipients have included Ed Viesturs and Ed Webster.

Defenders of Boukreev

In an article in Salon magazine that revisited the 1996 Everest tragedy, writer Weston DeWalt says, "I spoke with Beidleman on April 17, 1997 -- three months before the submission of the manuscript for "The Climb" -- and in the course of that conversation I asked him about a comment he had made during the audio-taped debriefing of Mountain Madness climbers at the Everest Base Camp on May 15, 1996. Beidleman's comment: "I knew Anatoli had gone down. I had no problem with that. I knew that it would have been nice for him to stay, but at the same time it wouldn't have necessarily facilitated our descent any better. I wasn't aware of his instructions to go down immediately from Scott, but after hearing that, I support that. I think that's a very good idea, and, in fact, had he not gone down, his efforts at the bottom collecting people wouldn't have been possible."

DeWalt continues, "Krakauer's claim -- which (Everest climber Martin) Adams says is not true -- to have been a witness to the first of the Boukreev-Fischer exchanges [re: Boukreev descending ahead of his team] was the same one he made to me when I interviewed him on April 21, 1997. Krakauer offered, "There were five people present for that. Scott and Andy Harris are dead. Anatoli, Martin Adams and I all heard this conversation." As the interview went on, Krakauer backed away from that position and said, "What I do know is what Martin told me." And the second exchange, the one in which Boukreev said that he and Scott agreed to the need for a rapid descent? In my April 21, 1997, interview with Krakauer, I asked him if he knew "for a fact" that a second exchange between Boukreev and Fischer had not taken place. Reflecting upon his suspicion that there had not been a second exchange, he said, "I could be wrong about that. I'm not -- I didn't -- I was there. I left the step [Hillary Step] before Anatoli. Now Scott himself -- I thought their conversation had ended by that point. Maybe I'm wrong. I wasn't there. But I'd be surprised if it continued beyond the time after I left, by the nature of -- well, anyway, I don't know that."

DeWalt adds: "If I limit myself to the subjects of Krakauer's last response to Salon, one comes immediately to mind: Krakauer's charge that Anatoli was inadequately dressed on summit day, a charge proven to be untrue after an examination of photographs taken on the summit of Everest on May 10, 1996."

Annapurna 1997

In the winter of 1997, Boukreev was attempting to climb the south face of Annapurna I (8,078 m) 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 5,700 m (18,700 ft) 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 (5,200 m/17,060 ft). 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:

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

References

*"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.

External links

* [http://www.boukreev.org/ Anatoli Boukreev Memorial Fund]
* [http://classic.mountainzone.com/news/boukreev-avalanche.html Boukreev Killed on Annapurna]
* [http://classic.mountainzone.com/climbing/fischer/letters.html Boukreev and Krakauer debate the facts]

See also

* List of climbers
* 1996 Everest Disaster