Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world, and is a dream for many climbers everywhere in the world. However sometimes these dreams end up in catastrophe, much like what happened in 1996 to three teams on the mountain. Rob Hall’s Adventure Consultants team, Scott Fischer’s Mountain Madness, and the Taiwanese team led by Makalu Gau. There were 33 climbers split across those three teams attempting to summit on May 10th, 1996, of those, 19 climbers would be stuck in the ‘death zone’. Every team on the mountain was faced with moral decisions on the mountain during this time. Should they look out for others and be selfless? Or only look out for themselves? This is important on Everest since if you look out for …show more content…
So that’s what I am talking about today.
The person I believe was the most selfish on the mountain was Ian Woodall. He was the leader of the South African expedition, which was at camp four, the nearest camp to the summit and next to the ‘death zone’. The reason I believe he was the most selfish because of a few reasons. The first reason, is he didn’t help set up ropes in advance. One of the reasons why so many climbers got stuck was because there was bottlenecking on the mountain while people waited to set up ropes. If Woodall had helped set up the ropes, maybe less people wouldn’t have been stuck up on the mountain, and the deaths of Rob Hall and Doug Hansen would’ve been prevented in my opinion, they got stuck in the storm because they were so far behind the turnaround time due …show more content…
He proved to be unreliable, untrustworthy, and completely selfish. He is responsible, in my opinion, for some of the deaths on the mountain. He is someone who I would never trust for anything. Mike Groom on the other hand, would be the person I would completely trust to climb with. He was proven in 1996 to know what he is doing as a guide, and unlike Woodall, he saved lives by being selfless, instead of being selfish and letting his clients die on the mountain. Mount Everest is one of the most hostile and inhabitable places in the world, and sometimes, the mountain throws unpredictable circumstances your way, and you have to make decisions that could either end or save yours or someone else's life. I would climb with Mike, because he is responsible and does what a guide should do, and that is look out for his clients. No matter what the