Greg, our camp manager, recorded
where we would keep these medications.
If our Sherpa or another teammate
needed to give us medication, Greg
could ask someone over the radio to
help. Diamox was for altitude sickness
issues, Dexamethasone for cerebral
edema and Nifedipine was for
pulmonary edema.
After I reviewed the items I needed
for the summit I needed to go to the
bathroom, so I removed my oxygen
mask and went outside. The wind was
blowing snow sideways. I asked Harry
where to go and he pointed to an area
behind our tents. Camp 4 looked like a
scene out of a zombie apocalypse. Trash
all over the place – old propane tanks,
cans, bottles, shredded tents, broken
tent poles and human waste. I found a
mostly barren area of rock and old tin
cans and with my down suit down
around my ankles I added another pile
to Camp 4. I was gone just long enough
to feel the effects of no supplemental
oxygen at 26,000 ft. I hurried back to my
tent, but wearing just my outside boot
liners to save time made me wobblier.
Huey came into our tent around 3:00 p.m.
We learned that he was suffering from
altitude issues. He was cognitively
impaired and exhausted. An hour earlier
he had stopped on the Geneva Spur,
just 15 minutes from Camp 4 and
wouldn’t move. Funuru (our Sherpa
manager) and Harry (our IMG guide)
talked to his Sherpa and eventually
got him going again.
Now in our tent, he was being questioned
by our guide, Harry. They cranked up his
oxygen from 1 liter per minute while
resting to 10 liters per minute. I was in
charge of forcing him to drink while
hand-feeding him peanut M&M’s.
He didn’t speak for first hour after
arriving at our tent.
My Sherpa, Pega, came by our tent to
help me prepare my backpack with a
new oxygen tank. We talked about
what I needed to bring. Another
Sherpa, Dawa, refilled my two water
bottles. I used one bottle to make
Ramen noodles. I was checking the
pockets of my down suit to make sure
I had my rescue medications in my right
chest pocket. At basecamp we had
labeled our Diamox, Dexamethasone
and Nifedipine by color.
Back in my tent I was now inserting the
heated boot liners in the internal boots
and running the wire up through the
legs of my down suit and connecting
it to the batteries that I had on both the
left and right inside pockets. With my
boots on I was nearly ready to go.
Chris was putting drink mix into his
Nalgene. Huey was still deciding if he
was going to go to the summit at all.
He was feeling better, but because he
was so exhausted getting to Camp 4,
going up was a big risk. I quickly added
another top layer just in case! I then
added my energy powder, UCAN, that
I had discovered months earlier at my
gym, to one thermos. I had been using
it every time we had a big day of climbing.
JAN UARY/FEBRUARY 2020 | P EN N SYLVAN IA DEN TAL JOURNAL
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