40 years ago: “White Limbo” on Mount Everest

Everest North Face in the last daylight
Everest North Face in the last daylight (Great Couloir in the shadwo)


It has never been repeated to this day. That says it all about the “White Limbo” route through the North Face of Mount Everest, which the Australians Tim Macartney-Snape and Greg Mortimer used to reach the summit at 8,849 meters on 3 October 1984 – 40 years ago today. They were climbing without bottled oxygen. The American Everest chronicler Walt Unsworth (1928-2017) once described the Australian expedition as “one of the greatest climbs ever done on the mountain”.

In addition to Macartney-Snape and Mortimer, Geoffrey Bartram, Andrew Henderson and Lincoln Hall were part of the Australian team that set out to open up a new route through the North Face without breathing masks. They named it White Limbo – after a song by the former rock band Australian Crawl from 1983.

Through the Norton Couloir

#The five Australians started on the Central Rongbuk Glacier and climbed to the summit through the so-called “Great Couloir”. It is also known as the Norton Couloir – after the British climber Edward Norton (1884-1954), a member of the legendary Everest expedition in 1924, during which George Mallory and Andrew Irvine went missing on their summit attempt. Norton had previously reached an altitude of 8,573 meters via the upper part of the couloir, without bottled oxygen. It was not until 1978 that this altitude was exceeded without a breathing mask – by Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler on their first Everest ascent without bottled oxygen.

3D view of Mount Everest
The Great Couloir (red arrow)

The fall of 1984, when the Australians attempted the North Face, was a snowy one. Avalanches thundered down again and again. Some of their equipment was buried. It was only after around two months of adverse weather conditions that the Australian quintet saw a realistic chance of reaching the summit. Their first and last, that was clear to everyone. After all, eight weeks in thin air had taken their physical toll – which ultimately robbed three climbers of their summit success.

At the summit just before sunset

Bartram turned back at 7,400 meters because he showed symptoms of life-threatening high-altitude cerebral edema. The other four climbed – unroped – through the couloir and spent an uncomfortable night from October 2nd to 3rd on a narrow ledge at 8,150 meters, all together in a tent. On the summit day, Hall gave up at an altitude of 8,300 meters – because of the icy cold.

Macartney-Snape was the first to reach the summit just before sunset, followed shortly afterwards by Mortimer. They were the first Australians to stand on the highest point on earth. Henderson had to throw in the towel 50 meters below. Because his crampons were broken and he had to repair them, he had to take off his gloves. The result: severe frostbite on his fingers. After the expedition, the upper phalanges of nine of his fingers had to be amputated.

“Risks off the scale”

The descent took more than two days. Mortimer also showed symptoms of high-altitude cerebral edema. On 6 October, all five Australian climbers were back at base camp. “In hindsight, the risks were off the scale,” Mortimer told Australian Geographic magazine, ”they were eight to ten on the Richter scale.”

Macartney-Snape returned to Everest in 1990. Under the motto “From sea to summit” – he later founded the outdoor equipment company of the same name – Tim hiked from the Bay of Bengal to the foot of the highest mountain on earth in three months and climbed it via the Nepalese normal route – again without bottled oxygen and without Sherpa support. “Everest is, and will always be, an enduring symbol of hope, striving and achievement,” writes the now 68-year-old on his website.

Social media & sharing icons powered by UltimatelySocial
error

Enjoy this blog? Please spread the word :)