• Everest North Side:

Numerous Expeditions are now at Base Camp. Several Expeditions have been to ABC, some higher. There is a large Russian team leading the way up the mountain. We are told of an one Chinese Expedition on the mountain this spring with only One Chinese climber and numerous Sherpa climbers. The Chinese climber wants to film from the Summit of Everest.  

Graham Hoyland, with the BBC expedition, and Juan Oiarzabal ,with the Spanish Expedition attempting to recreate the ascent of 1924 of Mallory and Irvine, both have been to ABC and so far appear to be having no problems. 

• Everest South Side:

Camp 2 is established for most expeditions. "Expeditions" are forming from "independent climbers". Camp 3 established for some expeditions. The Sherpas on Babu's expedition have been above Camp 3. Christine Boskoff, who is climbing with Peter Habeler has announced an "expected end of April" Summit attempt. See her last dispatch on EverestNews.com.

Gabriel Filippi, the French Canadian climber who was climbing Everest with Babu Sherpa, and came down from Camp 2 with problems, as reported earlier on EverestNews.com, descended below base camp on Wednesday to see if he could recover enough to make an attempt at the Summit. Gabriel clearly wants to stay, but his chances appear low at this point.

• The Millennium Seven Summits Expedition lead by Gavin Bate http://adventurealternative.com and John Barry. EverestNews.com will feature full dispatches and photos from this expedition. 

Dispatch: Everest Base Camp 

• Everest Spring 2000: Byron Smith

Current Status: Camp II is a hub of bustling activity with 12 expeditions now set up in the windy Western Cwm. Byron Smith and Tim Rippel will spend two more days in this camp on the glacial moraine before heading to Camp III for one night. Then it is  back to Basecamp.

Today's diary entry is another update from Virginia Robinson, in her ongoing Physician's log. 

Check his diary entry for more http://cbc.ca/everest2000/

• Andalucia Everest Expedition leader: MANUEL GONZALEZ DIAZ

This experienced group of seven climbers includes two women   Manuel Gonzαlez, Manuel Salazar, Shelter Ortega, Immaculate Fernandez, Santiago Millαn, Fernando Fernandez-Villancos and Jose Antonio Perez. They have trained the last year for Everest.

Rough Translation: In their words...

Dispatch: In the next week the Expedition Andalusian will install Camp 3 at 8000 meters. The expedition Andalusian has completed the installation of the C2, at 6380 meters. For 5 days the climbers have been trying to adapt to the altitude. In this phase of adapting the nine climbers are optimistic as far as the general conditions. Today, while four climbers have descended to BC, five have gone to the flank of the Lhotse to observe others working to fix ropes on the wall, reaching 6900 meters. "The wall of the Lhotse appears like a true crystal, very frozen  and with hardly any accumulated snow. This has caused the Sherpas to "draw up the route of ascent".  Sherpas work to supply Camp 2 and will remain in Camp 2 until the complete installation of Camp 3. For two days Sherpas have been bring oxygen up to he Camp 2. Of concern is the fact that not all the oxygen  cylinders, regulators and masks have still not been received.

EverestNews.com will publish the Andalucia reports in English. Their reports in Spanish, pictures, and more will be on the http://www.deporteandaluz.com/everest.htm site.

• Danish Expedition: Thrane & Thrane

The satellite communication company, Thrane & Thrane, is sponsoring the first all Danish Mount Everest Expedition. The expedition named ‘BigE – Thrane & Thrane Danish Everest Expedition 2000’ -  All eight members of the BigE-expedition are among the most experienced Danish climbers with significant mountaineering experience. Leader of the expedition and team doctor is Henrik Jessen Hansen. 

Update: They are at Camp 2 Check their reports at www.tt.dk 

• Graham Ratcliffe on oxygen: 

Graham Ratcliffe, the first climber from the UK who reached the Summit of Everest from both the North and South Sides.

An EverestNews.com reader asked: In his book  describing his 1953 summit climb, Hillary states that the oxygen apparatus that he and Tenzing used  delivered 4 liters of oxygen per minute. Yet the practice today as described in Jon Krakauer's "Into Thin Air" and other Everest books I've read is to use only a flow rate of 2 liters per minute. For commercial expeditions, where the success rate is  determined by the number of people who actually summit and people are paying a huge sum of money for their one shot at the summit, you would think it  would be advantageous to use a higher flow rate like the original Hillary/Tenzing summit climb. Is this lower rate strictly driven by the difficulty of caching additional oxygen bottles high up on the mountain or is there some other reason? 

[Graham] There are several reasons for the different oxygen flow rates used between 1953 and modern day ascents of Everest. 

1. The oxygen equipment carried by Hillary and Tenzing was much heavier than today, I  believe their apparatus weighed over 40 pounds, and the extra effort to carry this required more oxygen. 

2. One could also argue they were climbing from the Balcony area as the last camp, much nearer to the summit than the South Col and had estimated their  climbing time on the maximum load they could  reasonably carry. I must admit I had the dubious pleasure of carrying a 44 pound rucksack to the summit on the North side.  We could not get the caps off our lightweight bottles without resorting to using ice axes....which not surprisingly did not appeal,  so I made my ascent using two of the heavy iron bottles used for sleeping on.  The surprising thing is once I got into the climb I was too absorbed and did not notice the weight. 

3. As the late Anatoli Boukreev said to me ''Graham it is not easy to be first.'' 

We now know what flow rate of oxygen we can safely climb on without overloading ourselves with too much to carry. In 1953 they were climbing on theories of what should happen...but no one knew for sure. Today expeditions try to balance the logistics of getting the oxygen supplies up high within the reasonable needs of the team. 

Graham Ratcliffe 

• Finnish News

Mr. Antti Mankinen (Everest Summit 99) and Mr. Nico Backstrom from Finland try to repeat "Talking about Tsampa". This route to trekking peak Lobuje East (6119 meters) that was climbed by Tomaz Humar, Janez Jeglic and Carlos Carsolio in October 1, 1997. The route follows demanding North-East face. Source: Jukka Tarkkala 

• Annapurna Spring 2000: 

EverestNews.com will follow the attempt on Annapurna of the "International Annapurna 2000 Expedition": We think you will find these daily reports very interesting. Go to their site for the pictures and dispatches in Spanish. Their web site: www.interofer.es/annapurna2000 with reports in Spanish, Pictures and more !

Title: New arrivals at Base Camp

Weather: Partly Cloudy

Next Objective: Climb to Camp 2

Update: Today the base camp increased its population. The final expedition that will attempt Annapurna this spring installed its tents today with the help of two helicopters that transported their materials.  This is a French-Nepali joint military expedition.  As the new expedition arrived, the  American team announced that they will leave the French route.  According to its leader, Viesturs " We have decided to avoid all the dangerous areas of the mountain, those most exposed to avalanches ". Tonight the sky around Annapurna was lit by a new moon, a good omen. However, this is not sufficient because we must only hope that the newly fallen snow compacts quickly.  This will not endanger the climbers along the slopes of this colossal mountain. The news of the day is that one of the Port of Barcelona's tents was destroyed by a helicopter blade.  'Jake' Molins said, "I had a small scare and the tent can be replaced ". In the hours before the supper, Feijjo, gave an interview to the show "Onda Rambla - Onda Cero.  He displayed from the base camp his poster and confessed that he loves the Atlιtic of Bilbao soccer team.

EverestNews.com has added a Spring 2000 Annapurna Page where EverestNews.com will report News on this expedition and other Annapurna News. 

• Manaslu 2000:

Alberto and Felix Inurrategi are at Camp 2. After reaching the Summit of Manaslu they plan on heading to Annapurna !

Alberto and Felix Inurrategi are attempting to finish the 14 8000 meters peaks this year.

• Other Expeditions on Manaslu this Spring:

Source: Himalayan Center Kathmandu Nepal

• Coming Soon: What does Reinhold Messner, Erhard Loretan, Krzysztof Wielicki, Carlos Carsolio, and Juan Oiarzabal, the five men still alive who have reached all the Summits of the 14 8000 meter peaks, have to say about what the Summit is. 

All the feedback from the readers of EverestNews.com is clear. The Summit is the Summit, not a fore summit or a lower summit, but the top.