Climber Jim Morrison jumped off his skis to the left, dripping snow into a steep gorge on Everest’s north face, then jumped down to the right, breathing heavily in the thin oxygen air.
Below him, 9,000 feet (2,700 meters) of snow, ice, and rock fell. This is the most unforgiving ski area on the planet.
Skiing had never been done before Morrison did so.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison told The Associated Press on Tuesday about the historic October 15 run: “It was a spectacular four hours skiing through a horrendous snowpack.”
Mr. Morrison, along with 10 other climbers and documentary maker Jimmy Chin, who is co-directing a documentary about Mr. Morrison’s climb, climbed Everest’s infamous north face through the Hornbine Couloir. Chin also filmed Alex Honnold climbing El Capitan in Yosemite National Park without ropes for the documentary “Free Solo.”
The adventure is “the skiing equivalent of free soloing,” Chin said. “If you blow off an edge or slip anywhere on the line, you’re done. You’re falling from 9,000 feet.”
The ski area begins at the top of Everest, about 29,000 feet (8,800 meters) above sea level, in the death zone, where people can’t stay alive for long.
“When it comes to big mountains and climbing, it’s like landing on the moon,” said Jeremy Evans, who wrote a book about the last person to attempt a slide from the top. Young snowboarder Marco Siffredi went missing on that slope in 2002.
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This adventure was dreamed up by Mr. Morrison and his life partner, accomplished ski mountaineer Hilary Nelson. they were going to do it together till then Her death will be in 2022 While skiing on the world’s 8th highest mountain.
From then on, Mr. Morrison began traveling for them.
At the foot of the Everest climbing route, they craned their necks before making the four-day climb to the summit.
“We have spent our lives climbing big mountains,” Chin said. “To this day, I have never seen anything more frightening as a climbing goal.”
Only five people have ever climbed it, and no one has climbed it since 1991. Unlike other popular routes to the top of Everest, which follow the ridge, this route up the mountain’s imposing north face was called the super-direct route. Go straight up and then go straight down.
The 12-person team climbed through snow fields, rocks and patches of ice, facing the possibility of falling rocks and avalanches. They carefully timed their trip in tight weather conditions, seeking enough snow and safe conditions for skiing.
At night, they spent hours cutting ridges into the ice and snow so they could squeeze in and sleep, always tethered to ropes.
One night, Chin said, they were huddled on the mountainside as gusty winds dumped snow from above and threatened to blow their tents off the mountain.
Mr. Morrison fell asleep. Chin needed sleep too, and they were doing everything they could to keep him safe on the mountain.
“That’s why I put on earplugs because I thought, ‘If I get blown off the mountain, I don’t want to know what’s going on,'” he said.
The sun has risen. As he continued climbing, Morrison assessed the conditions of the snow he was about to slide on, but “basically everything I saw looked scary. The snow conditions were really, really bad,” he said.
But with Nelson in his heart, Morrison continued, “As we got higher and higher and closer and closer to the death zone, we got closer and closer to her.”
The sun was shining at the top. The Himalayas were all around.
They celebrated together and took selfies. Mr Morrison scattered some of Mr Nelson’s ashes.
Then, as Morrison put on his skis and looked around at his teammates, he realized, “‘Okay, now I’m in a completely different world. I’m on my own.'”
He stopped by doing a controlled hop turn in the air. Details of the routes he studied, imagined, witnessed, read and dreamed occupied his mind. He wasn’t thinking about the possibility of falling, only thinking about his next turn. At that altitude, every breath was a challenge.
He later texted a friend: “It was so bad I was able to shred a good chunk of it.”
Morrison used ropes at several spots, including some where there were only rocks, but he relied less on them than he expected.
He let out a breath as he neared the bottom and crossed to safety.
He screamed and cried and spoke to Nelson.
The next morning, he went outside and looked up at the towering North Face, he said.
“And you could feel that Hillary was truly on top of the world.”
