원정 개요

BC at normal site
C1 below North Col (never slept in)
High point at C1 site.

This team of four Japanese, no Sherpas, arrived at BC on 20 September. The site for C1 at 5400m, not far below the NE Col, was visited several times between the 22nd and the 27th to dump gear, but was never slept in.

On the 28th, the four members set out at 6:00 am from BC to occupy C1. At 10:00 am an avalanche struck. They were slightly scattered; Yamamoto was at C1 (5400m) and Honda 200m directly below him; Tanabe and Shimada to the right of those two, Tanabe at 5300m and Shimada at 5150m, according to the only survivor, Shimada.

When the avalanche and the fierce wind it created was almost upon them, Tanabe radioed to Shimada, "Look up, avalanche" and then was buried by it. Shimada was carrying a pair of skis on his back, and the wind pushed him with his skis 200m into soft snow. He got a mouthful of snow but was uninjured. Despite the pain in in his right shoulder, neck, ribs on his right side and right ankle, he took snow bars and used them and his skis to probe and dig for his three teammates, but he found none of them and returned alone to BC at 6:00 pm, when it was getting dark.

During the next two days, Shimada, Hiraoka, leader of the other Japanese team, and five Sherpas searched for the three bodies in hard snow (the Sherpas were equipped with snow saws). They found nothing. On 9 October, Hiraoka and the five Sherpas returned to BC with two expert searchers who brought special equipment from Japan, and in mid-October Honda's body was discovered 50m under the snow. It was brought to Kathmandu, where an autopsy gave asphyxiation as the probable cause of death, and it was cremated at Swayambhunath stupa on the city's edge.