Storm Over Everest: Your Thoughts

Check Out the Complete Coverage of Everest 2008, Now Taking Place.

I recently had the opportunity to watch the PBS Special Frontline: Storm Over Everest. I have to say that it surprised me how well this all came together. David Breashears, who directed and produced this documentary, done a wonderful job of representing what took place during the storm of 1996.

Unfortunately, I didn’t catch the program Monday night, but rather watched it this evening online at the PBS site. Thankfully, it looks like this particular documentary may stay up for quite some time, allowing anyone that would like to, to watch it for free. The program lasts almost two hours, but it is two hours well spent.

While I am thinking about it, the Online version of this program was great. More stations are going to this format to draw in more interest from the public. The program ran smooth on the PBS player, unlike on some sites where you have to wait for the whole program to load etc. You get this one immediately. Kudos to them for putting out a high class program.

The PBS site also offers a bit more information into this particular program, including an in-depth interview with David Breashears, as well as biographies and time lines for all the information involved. If you haven’t seen this yet, stop on over there and check it out. Then come back and tell me your thoughts.

Back in 1996, when this originally happened, it stirred up quite a bit of controversy. Rob Hall and Scott Fisher, two of the top mountain guides in the world, each lost their life. Discussions would start to take place about the relevancy of high-altitude rescue, whether Mt. Everest had become to crowded, and just how far guides would go to get their teams to the summit. Many of these same discussions still take place today. Everest is certainly more crowded now than in 1996. High-altitude rescues, while not common place, have occurred on Everest and many peaks elsewhere, but at the same time, as recently as 2006 a climber by the name of David Sharp died without a rescue attempt.

I want to know all of your thoughts, not only on Storm Over Everest, but on these areas of discussion as well. What could be done to aid in high altitude rescue today, that possibly couldn’t have been done in 1996?

With climbers currently sitting in Everest base camp, fully prepared for their upcoming summit pushes in the next week–Close to 500 of them will be attempting this feat from the South side alone–this was definitely a good time to touch on all of these subjects. I am looking forward to hearing your take on these issues. Comment below.