(Seahawks fan Doug Pierson is
in Nepal to climb Mt. Everest. Doug is a member of the U.S. Marine
Reserves and also Seattle Mountain Rescue, where his teammates are
also big Seahawks fans.)
By Doug Pierson
5/23/2008
Doug Pierson |
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Just made Base Camp after a long, hard day... 7 hours in
driving snow from Camp II to Base Camp with heavy loads. So here are
two pics- both are of the Seahawks ball that I hauled to the top of
the world. One is of Nepal in the background and our teammate Willie
Benegas in the foreground on an absolutely beautiful day- zero wind,
no clouds, full moon for the entire night climb to make the South
Summit in time for sunrise. The second pic is of one of our Sherpas
who summited- Tendi Sherpa, a teammate- Francisco Arredondo, and me
with the ball on the actual summit.
It was a busy day on the 21st, but because we left early, we beat
the mobs at the top and it was relatively peaceful while we were there.
The only crush was at the Hillary Step, a natural bottleneck where
we had about a 10 minute wait before we could downclimb and get outta'
there.
Two funny stories: As you likely know, there's absolutely no air up
there. I took my mask off for about 5 minutes at one point and thought
I was going to pass out. Anyway, so I had the ball deflated for the
climb so that I had available space in my pack for oxygen bottles,
etc. When it was picture time, I pulled out a mini pump Nike pump
that I brought and works extremely well at sea level. Man, I must
have been pumping that ball for 5 minutes before it even looked half
inflated. My team got impatient and I had to tell them to chill out
while I made the flattened ball even halfway resemble a football.
"Is it working?" "Chill out, dude!" Pretty funny.
I just left it inflated for the downclimb.
Then we made it back to our tent, and one of our Sherpas that had
to turn back around 28,000' was waiting. I was sharing a tent on
the South Col for the night with two Sherpas, and we basically just
fell asleep in our down climbing suits. While we were warm, we didn't
have pillows, so one Sherpa and I shared my pack as a pillow and
passed out immediately. But the Sherpa that didn't go all the way
was still full of energy, so he was rooting around outside doing
God only knows what 'till bedtime. When he crawled into the tent,
he didn't have a pillow, so I half deflated the Seahawks ball and
he used that as his pillow, all night.
5/13/2008
Any day now... weather window's looking good, and our team
leader is pulling together his strategy for us. Rumor that the South
Col is now roped, so only a matter of time. I'll be sending back
dispatches and our Base Camp manager will be posting throughout
our effort, so it'll be fairly recent on the blog.
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Doug
Pierson's bio:
Age: 37
Home: Seattle, WA.
Education: M.B.A. The College of William &
Mary
B.A. Ohio Wesleyan University
Career & Hobbies: Previously with IBM Global
Business Services
Quit in December to train full-time for Everest summit attempt.
U.S. Marine Corps Reserve:
Lt. Colonel
Two tours in Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Climbing Experience:
Seattle Mountain Rescue
Mt. Whitney (three times)
Mt. McKinley
San Gorgonio
San Jacinto
Mt. Rainier (three times per year)
Mt. Fuji (two winter ascents)
Mt. Olympus (30-hour speed climb)
Mt. Baker
Mt. Adams (five times)
Mt. Saint Helens
Mt. Hood (four times)
Mt. Everest |
5/12/2008
Just got back down from Camp III - wow a whole week has passed since
we were last in Base Camp... crazy. Francisco Arredondo (another
teammate of mine) enjoyed tossing the football at Camp II (21,000').
As a team we talked about it and are going to take the ball up to
the top when we go on our summit push in a few days.
We are all acclimatized now, so when the weather clears in a few
days we are going to go for it.
5/4/2008
Just a quick note... the team has made Camp II now (20,600 feet)
and are just waiting for this whole China torch thing to work itself
out. Once that does - hopefully in the next few days - we'll be
headed back up, this time to Camp III to acclimatize and get ready
for our summit push. On our next trip up through the Icefall I'll
be bringing the Seahawks football for some shots with Everest, the
South Col, Western Cwm and Lhotse Face as backdrop. Don't know how
high up I'll get the ball, but I'm going to try and get it all the
way up to the summit for you... no promises though.
We plan on leaving for our next acclimatization push in 2 days.
3/28/2008
I'm currently in Kathmandu just waiting for the green light, and everything
is going according to plan. I'm flying tomorrow morning first thing
to Lukla where we begin the long trek to Base Camp. General Dynamics
donated a rugged, solid state laptop to our team, and so I think that
we are going to be able to post updates all the way (if I have my
wish).
One of my good buddies and I are true blue Seahawks fans, and before
I left Seattle I swung by a Seahawks store outside Qwest Field and
picked up a Seahawks football so I can toss it with the Sherpas
and get them to be Seahawks fans too!
I'm going to take one or two photos of me converting Sherpas &
other climbers into Seahawks fans once I make Base, and then maybe
higher up, safety conditions allowing.
By the way, PBS Frontline is doing a special on Everest and asked
me if I could be their featured climber! Pretty cool. Click
here for that Everest show page.
And here's a link
to my blog, which will be more comprehensive, have more pictures,
etc. I'll be updating this regularly.
Go Hawks!!
-Doug
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