원정 개요

BC in lodge at Chhukung village.

The team made a lodge in the village of Chhukung as their base. Above that they pitced no fixed camps but moved entirely from one bivouac to another when not down in Chhukung, which was at an altitude of 4700m.

They arrived at Chhukung on 29 September, and the next day all three members climbed to the summit of Island Peak, which was close by, and returned to Chhukung the same day.

After two days, rest, they went to Lhotse Shar to acclimatize more. The night of 3 October they spent in a bivouac at 5900m at the col between Island Peak and Lhotse Shar before its SE Ridge. On the 4th they moved closer to the ridge and bivouacked at 6400m and the following day they climbed to 6800m, just before the SE Ridge, and then retreated to Chhukung because of many windslabs, avalanches danger and deep snow.

They rested at Chhukung on the 6th and 7th, and on the 8th they moved to 5200m at the bottom of the South Face for their attempt to scale Lhotse. But on the 9th, Blanco was not well: he had a headache and fluid had collected in his lungs (perhaps due to pulmonary edema, perhaps pneumonia). He left the team that day, while Tosas and Corominas moved up to 6400m on the face to the left of the Yugoslav 1981 route.

On 10 October the two Spaniards tried to go higher, but the 50-degree snow slope with half a meter of dangerous fresh snow covering hard ice left no place to put their tent. They were back to Chhukung instead.

From the 11th to the 19th, they stayed in Chhukung during a period of changeable weather. On 20th October they went back to the mountain. They bivouacked again at 5200m and on the 21st they went again to 6400m. But they saw that conditions on the slope above had not changed, and they returned to Chhukung the same day.

They stayed at Chhukung. Tosas every day hiked for two hours to the site of their bivouac at 5200m and every day found that snow conditions on the face were still the same. Moreover now the wind had become very strong at altitudes of 7000m to 7500m and the weather forecast predicted the continuation of these winds. On the 24th they decided to abandon the climb.

On the 30th Tosas and Corominas they left Chhukung and trekked around to visit the base camps for Everest and Ama Dablam. Corominas stayed at Ama Dablam and joined a Spanish women's expedition on the normal SW Ridge route, while Tosas returned to Kathmandu on 2 November.