Dan Mazur's Kangchenjunga Spring 2002

Dispatch March 15th, 2002: We all rested in basecamp. Except for Andrew, who went up the fixed lines alone from camp 1 to give it a try. He came down in the middle of the day, saying it had been windy, and a piece of old rope had broken in his descender. He reported being surprised and "spun around", then he said he was ok, and continued on about 100 meters down the slope or about 5 or ten minutes walking. Then, apparently, he was walking on some low angle snow-ice, tripped, fell, and banged his knee. Then he walked all the way back down to basecamp. He complained of his knee hurting. We examined it, it looked slightly swollen , but did not seem to be dislocated and prescribed elevation of the knee, icing, and ibuprofen, accompanied by plenty of rest and fluids. He seemed in good spirits and was eating and drinking plenty, on his way to recovery. We decided to remove all old rope on the route, and to only use new rope, and suggested that no one should climb or be on the mountain alone in the future. The two Tibetans, Pemba and Pinso, headed up to camp 1 in the afternoon. They were on a mission to remove all of the old rope, and finish fixing the rope to the top of the big ice/snow serac/cornice which we guess is at about 6300 meters. We imagine that camp 2 will be located in or around this serac/cornice atop the ridge, as it looks like it might provide some kind of barrier to the fearsome looking winds. We miss Brian Mertes, and hope he is recovering and relaxing well in Lhasa from his bout of illness. Other than that, our team seems to be doing quite well, given the challenges of surviving out here in the Tibetan Plateau. 

Thank you very much. Cheers for now. Yours
Sincerely, Daniel Mazur from http://www.SummitClimb.com

Please join us in watching the "live-update" status of 2002 climbing expeditions to Nepal and Tibet on: http://www.everestnews.com/kang2002.htm

Note: In March of 2002, this team is attempting the 7200 meter Mount Nojin Kansa (picture below), a moderate peak near Lhasa Tibet, which has never had a western ascent. In April-June of 2002, they will be attempting Kangchenjunga, the third highest peak in the world, located in Eastern Nepal.

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