Everest Page #3

haven't used crampons before

the left and rights are marked with an

"L" and an "R,"

so you can't get it wrong.

All right?

So, simple.

First of all,

you push it into the shoe with this.

Unbelievable.

If it isn't the mayor

of Base Camp!

Scott Fischer,

Mr. Mountain Madness.

In the flesh.

You want a cup?

Sit down, man.

Acclimatize!

Okay. I'm normally

a tea man myself,

but let's give it a go.

Thank you so much.

Wow. It's crazy

this year, eh?

I know, man.

Some idiot Kiwi goes and

invents Himalayan guiding

and look what happens.

Yeah, it didn't take you too

long to get in on the act.

Gotta make a living, man.

You went ahead and fixed the icefalls,

I see.

Yeah, yeah.

It's pretty messy up there this year.

Yeah?

Crevasses are pretty big.

Strung four or five

ladders across.

You used good

ropes though, didn't you?

You ready? Okay.

This is, um, April 7th,

about 10:
30 a.m.,

this is Sandy Hill Pittman,

reporting for NBC

Interactive Media

and we are officially at Everest Base Camp!

She one of yours?

Oh, yeah.

Someone went and

stole my journalist

so I had to get another one.

Hmm.

She's a lot easier on the eye

than Jon Krakauer,

that's for sure.

Listen, just to be clear,

I didn't steal your journalist.

Hey, man, it's all good.

Outside magazine gave me a call.

Hey. Hey!

They gave me a call.

- Said they wanted to...

- It's all good, man.

They were gonna send

a journalist up the hill

and asked me if

I was interested.

It was his call in the end.

All right, Caroline MacKenzie,

team doctor.

Why don't you kick it off, Caro.

- Hi, everyone.

- Hey, Caro.

Hi there.

Sorry.

That's fine.

Um...

So Rob and Harold

and Mike will tell you

all sorts of stuff

about mountaineering,

but from a medical standpoint

getting you to the top of

Everest is really about oxygen.

And the lack of it.

To give you the best

chance of summiting

you need to prepare your bodies

for the thin air up there.

So, over the next month,

before the final ascent

you're gonna make three

partial acclimatizing ascents

returning here to

Base Camp after each one.

The bad news is that each ascent

begins and ends

with the Icefall.

I'm sorry, but there

is no way around it.

There are millions

of tons of glacial ice

continually moving

day and night.

You got seracs

the size of tower blocks,

you got crevasses so deep they

probably don't even have a bottom.

It is not a place that you wanna

get caught hanging out in,

especially when the sun hits it.

So we're gonna be

up nice and early

and through that

as soon as possible.

Now the Sherpas have gone ahead

and fixed the ladders

across the crevasses

and we've made it as

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