Volkov: "So it happened that on the mountain we were hit by an avalanche. It relates
to a pure chance, a pure coincidence of an objective danger of a mountain that can not be
eliminated by conscious activities. We did everything we should, setting the tent right
against the rock, and everybody was saying that 10 meters is an area of normal life,
avalanches don't get there. It was obvious - when the avalanche comes you do a projection
and see - it can't turn there. Nevertheless, it did turn. It is a case of a pure objective
risk, when you have to shrug your shoulders and say: yes, it does take place in a mountain
climbing. In this case common people are right in saying that we are mad. Unfortunately,
it takes place. |
Victor Kolesnichenko and Andrei Volkov near the 1st camp tent
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At first everything was very good. Excellent weather. It was a very warm evening. I went
to bed in my sleeping bag wearing only pants. Victor and I planned our tactics so as to
start working as early as possible, foreseeing a bad condition of show. We considered
getting up at 2 a.m. and starting ascending at 3 a.m. still in the dark. The route is
known, the ropes are fixed - why not? Well, that's all. We went to bed. Further mystical
things start. Just before falling asleep Victor said: lets turn our heads to the opposite
side. What for? Either the angle was not balanced or something else. I was too lazy to
debate, so we turned round, our heads to the rock. |
The second fortuity. Usually I don't use my boots as a pillow. In this case I made a
pillow from the inner boots and fell asleep on it. At 1.45 a.m. I felt a typical stab in
the back. It was a piece of ice. After a second the avalanche started to flood us,
increasingly... very quickly. Everything fell on us at once, on the head, on everything...
It was a huge avalanche. We were caught by the very edge of it. The main bulk is hundreds
and hundreds of tons moving simultaneously, you see. Evidently there was a unusually warm
night, and it provoked such a gigantic avalanche, it skidded and its vortex fell into us.
A vortex. A lateral turbulence.
It was a soggy avalanche, a snowy-water pulp. There were pieces of ice. The best model for
it is concrete. Concrete with stones - it exactly reflects its structure, and the density
is roughly the same. This avalanche flows very slowly. I estimate its speed as 40
centimeters per second approximately. Roughly speaking, you can run away from that soggy
avalanche. But if you are caught by it, it can suffocate you even at a small depth. It has
one more feature: when it stops it becomes casehardened at once. After a minute you have
to peck it down, i.e. it can't be dug. It was known. So such an avalanche started filling
us up. It poured for, I don't know, may be five-six seconds, increasingly. A scream of
horror broke instinctively, you simply don't think about it. That's how you cry in fear. I
just had time to cross arms under my chest, and that saved me a little space. I already
couldn't stir a head, couldn't stir a foot. I could move one arm and my chest a little.
Everything calmed down. We couldn't stir even a little bit. What happened then could
hardly be described. May be it was a spasm of fear, but there was not enough oxygen - the
tent hugged our faces. There is no air under such avalanche, the snow is wet, it's soaked
by water. Victor turned out to stretch his arm and to make a hole out. Our heads were just
a few centimeters from the wall. He started tossing and turning and somehow freeing
himself. I started yelling that I'm choking. I was really choking, I catastrophically had
no air. Victor started tearing fabric where he could reach. He started breaking off and
throwing away lumps. It was a stress, in such a condition you can crush the mountains,
such a colossal strength appears. Also Victor is a physically strong man. So he threw away
the drift.
After 8-10 minutes he dug me out. He was standing in his pants barefoot on the snow, and I
was standing in my pants barefoot on the snow. There was some polyethylene bag lying
nearby. Our feet became frozen, and we stood on the bag. Here came the second success - I
thrust my arm and succeeded in dragging out my inner boots. We had an ice-axe and a sort
of an old shovel. Well, there was nothing for it. We had to find our clothes. So we
started digging with an ice-axe and throwing away lumps. So we dug out the tent.
The Japanese were bivouacking nearby. What unpleasantly amazed me? We both cried wildly.
The Japanese were not flooded. But they didn't render assistance. Previous evening they
put together all their equipment in one tent, and this tent was carried away completely.
The Japanese themselves slept in the second tent, close to the wall. It was really wise.
But they didn't come up to us. After 20 minutes or so, when we were digging, one guy came.
He asked: how are you? We said: not bad. We were standing in pants... Well, what else
could we say? When such things happen, everything else seems so inessential... As a matter
of fact, he brought a very good shovel thus helping is.
Well, we started digging. At 6 a.m. we finished excavations completely. We estimate the
amount of snow and ice we took away from the tent as one ton - one ton and a half. Arcs
for tent - it's a very strong titanium construction - but these arcs were all twisted and
broken. Where our heads were (the key point) the layer was about 50 centimeters thick, and
where our legs were - about a meter and a half. If we didn't turn round last night we
would never get out. I put my helmet at my foot - the helmet was crushed. Why were my legs
not crushed? There the plastic boots lay. They are so stiff that they formed a kind of a
screen that protected my body.
Well, then started some mysterious things, a sort of a humor... When climbers prepare to
sleep they usually hang eyeglasses under the roof of the tent because when you are
sleeping you can accidentally crush them. Oh yes, the eyeglasses are the obligatory
element, you can not ascend without them, you will burn your eyes. When everything cracked
and we walked there and back and dug it, it was absolutely clear that eyeglasses are
crushed down if the helmet is crushed down too. Victor and I understood already that we
would have to gather our belongings, dress ourselves and descend to the base camp. The
summit attempt was finished. But when we finally tore tent sections while dragging things
out, we found safe eyeglasses. It was a kind of magic. We could crush them ourselves a
dozen of times, and the avalanche all the more so. I can't give any rational explanation
for that... So I say to Victor: it is an omen. To tell the truth, both Victor and I are
thorough atheists and considered it just a joke. We dressed in semi-wet clothes, gathered
everything by 6 a.m. and went uphill. It was felt that we became overexcited, I was
shaking all the time like you feel when fighting.
As I can understand now, the psychological consequences of that event were dreadful since
later we committed so many mistakes. We climbed to the second camp feeling absolutely
exhausted, refreshed ourselves and spend about two or three hours there. But since such
adrenalin still remained (as if we were running away from somebody) we decided to clamber
to the third camp. We reached it by evening. It was growing dusky already. We spent about
sixteen hours on the route, were extremely tired, frozen, and ate only once up to that
time.
Next morning nice weather suddenly appeared, and we put our sleeping bags and down clothes
on the tent roof to dry. We understood clearly that at any moment any puff of the wind
would take this all away. I understand it now distinctly, but at that time a very strong
inhibition of reflexes occurred. Victor secured himself and fastened things to the tent
arc, but I simply laid them on the roof: the weather was beautiful, there was not a breath
of air. I just got into the tent (we started drinking tea - our favorite pastime during
relaxation) - the wind blew and it became somehow brighter, because out tent is pellucid
for light. I grew cold with terror, I and Victor looked at each other. I thrust my head
out of the tent: my one-piece down suit was gone - it is the main clothing for summitting -
and my down sleeping bag too. They flew away in a moment. No comments.
I said: if so happened, let's sit here for a while, we don't have to descend right now,
you see. We were sitting for about thirty minutes. Then I said to Victor: maybe there was
a miracle. You always want to believe in miracles. I dressed, fastened to a rope,
descended a little bit and far below found a stone of some bluish color. My heart missed a
beat. There was about 700 meters of ice slope with rocks and then a precipice 1 kilometer
high.
I descended about six ropes lower and saw that there was something that looked like my
down suit, sticking to the very last stone about five meters from the chasm (I still
couldn't discern because it was far away and there were no more ropes). I was alone. It
was surely a real challenge for me. The slope was not very steep, but I traversed an hour
and a half with two ice hammers on the fore-teeth of my crampons. I went holding my
breath, then took a short rest. My down suit barely caught a stone by its pocket. I
could touch it by hand, and it would fly away. Isn't it a miracle?!
This action took a total of three hours. Here we livened up for the second time. It was
possible to continue ascending. We prepared everything, put each thing in its bag, and
tied each bag up. We got up at 1 a.m., quickly made all ready, dressed ourselves and
started. Still at night we reached the fourth camp tired and happy - everything was
according to the plan, the weather is good and we stood firm. Here we got the third blow.
We tied up two bags - one with garbage (we threw it away later) and the second with the
film rolls, portable radio power supply and all the emergency medicines. But when I took
the bag and opened it I found only rubbish there. I was even unable to curse, the words
were senseless. Here we are, sitting in the fourth camp, and now it is necessary to
descend.
We started thinking about what could we do. It was above our strength to descend at once.
In any case it was necessary to spend a night here. But brains started working gradually
and we remembered that there was a battery in Victor's camera. We took the battery from
the camera and inserted it into the portable radio. That did it! The walkie-talkie started
working! The second thing that saved us were the remainings of food that were left by
previous Korean and Japanese expeditions. It was sufficient for us to have a bite. So we
started preparing for the summit attempt. That was pretty kettle of fish!
But it is not all still. After the summit we approached the vertical section between the
second and the first camps. So I'm hanging in that wall and suddenly hear a typical sound
of slipping stones, and a group of stones is advancing on me. There was an icy passage
there, and you have no place to hide, you hang on the rope fastened to it. I clenched my
teeth and started praying so God to save me. The prayer shouldn't be long because there
were about six seconds for these stones to fly. With a loud whine these huge stones flew
beside me. How did not they hit my head or cut a rope asunder! I was horror-stricken.
I descended lower, there was only one rope left, and here one more group of stones fell
down from the wall and tore a rope below to pieces. If I was there (it remained three or
so minutes for me to descend), I was caught. From one side, it is an objective danger,
but, from the other side, it was possible to avoid it tactically by starting early in the
morning. If you pass through this section up until noon as we did usually, it is
relatively safe. But I turned out to be there at 4 p.m. Everything was flying and whining
around me.
This ascent lead me several times to the very edge in spite of the superficial easiness...
Here is the story. I think that partially these mistakes were the consequences of the
previous stress. All the subsequent mistakes were just its consequences. It is a stern
school of life for a future. If something happens, you should... You shouldn't rush. Now I
understand it clearly. There is wisdom and truth in it".
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