원정 개요

BC on west side of Larkya La (1 hour walk from pass)
C1 directly above (due north of) Larkya La
High point on SE Ridge.

First tried to get into S Face directly but found huge icefall a big as Khumbu Icefall and very active (icefall should have been crossed going to face directly at 19,500 ft, but make no attempt to do so). 28th Oct decided to get to S Face via SE Ridge, which leads onto S Face and made C1 on 28th; 29th Burgess and Dawa Wangchu (Kharte near Kharikhola) went on recce to see if feasible to SE Ridge and decided it was and back to C1. 30th set out for ridge (and summit if possible, but this a "long shot"). Burgess, Golden, Whiteley, Nobles and Dawa Wangchu left C1 at 4:00 am; Nobles turned back after an hour (trouble with crampons and not entirely well) while other 4 continued. At 11:00 am were about 200 ft below SE Ridge and here Whiteley and Golden 300 ft behind Burgess and Dawa Wangchu. Dawa Wangchu was now leading and put in ice stake and Burgess climbed up to him and from there Dawa was to go on up and put in ice stake that would be better anchored. Dawa anchored rope and came down his fixed line and tied on another rope to fixed rope but became disconnected from fixed rope (probably rope broke after he had untied a knot Burgess had put there to tie off a flaw in the rope). Dawa fell 800 vertical feet (1000 ft in distance) but was still alive having ended at bottom of a section of very dangerous ice cliffs landing in deep snow. Burgess reached him in 30 minutes: he had massive head injuries (fractured skull) and bleeding from skull profusely and coughing blood. Burgess stayed with him 3 hrs, got him standing, could see but couldn't speak; tried to pull him down steep snow slope and got him down 60 ft and then Dawa disconnected his harness and took off gloves and turned away from Burgess and lay down signaling Burgess to go. Burgess left him. Now ice and ice cliffs will soon take him all the way down (he probably would have died in next half hour).

Now did not consider any more climbing.

Don't know whether SE Ridge would "go" - couldn't see how steep its sides are.