8 ms·
I can’t imagine having a hobby that involves passing by, and in some cases climbing over, the exposed remains of others who died doing that same activity.
by snorkel 3mo ago
I can’t imagine having a hobby that involves passing by, and in some cases climbing over, the exposed remains of others who died doing that same activity.
- killingtime74 3mo agoYeah and also knowing if something happens your team will definitely leave you
- TFNA 3mo agoA good friend of mine is a professional alpinist who focuses only climbing eight-thousanders with no supplementary oxygen. Through him I’ve met others and learned about this whole community. A number of people are as weird and eccentric as us here in computer-nerd circles; one is tempted to armchair-diagnose some as autistic and climbing as their fixation, so something like Green Boots or the death of peers just won’t stop them. (I envy them that their fixation gives them the physique of a Greek god and stories that can impress any listener, so they often manage to be very socially successful in spite of their quirks.)
- cindyllm 3mo ago[dead]
- 1over137 3mo agoAren't there only a dozen or so mountains above 8000 m? Can you really do that without supplementary oxygen? Amazing.
- RijilV 3mo ago14 of them. The first person to climb them all did so without supplemental oxygen. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Messner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinhold_Messner
- ijidak 3mo agoOk. This is the most interesting man in the world. Literally.
- modernerd 3mo agoIf you're ever in Northern Italy the Messner museum in Kronplatz is absolutely worth a visit. https://www.messner-mountain-museum.it/en/discover/corones/ https://www.messner-mountain-museum.it/en/discover/corones/
- m463 3mo agoHe made the first solo ascent of Mount Everest and, along with Peter Habeler, the first ascent of Everest without supplementary oxygen. He was the first person to climb all 14 eight-thousanders, doing so without supplementary oxygen. Messner was the first to cross Antarctica and Greenland with neither snowmobiles nor dog sleds and also crossed the Gobi Desert alone. He is widely considered to be the greatest mountaineer of all time. wow, even his hair is interesting
- lifestyleguru 3mo agoSure you can. Actually true climbers wear at all times a tight choker below 4000m to compensate excess oxygen in the air.
- ninth_ant 3mo agoA climber who was pivotally involved in the failed rescue efforts for the dead person in this article immediately left on a solo climb of a nearby mountain. He died just over a year later in another climbing incident. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoli_Boukreev https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatoli_Boukreev
- rob74 3mo agoFrom what I read, the 1996 Everest disaster involved two completely separate groups: Adventure Consultants/Mountain Madness, who ascended via the South Route (from Nepal), and the Indo-Tibetan Border Police expedition, who came via the North Route (from Tibet), so if they ever met, it was only at the summit. "Green Boots" was part of the latter group. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Mount_Everest_disaster#List_of_fatalities https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Mount_Everest_disaster#Li...
- ninth_ant 3mo agoAppreciate the clarification. While it was part of the same overall disaster, Boukreev‘s rescue efforts may not have been specifically towards Green Boots. From what I understand the final location of Green Boots was along the same route that Boukreev took when attempting to rescue climbers? But now I’m less certain — it seems like the furthest Boukreev in reached in attempted rescue was Fischer’s body which was well below Green Boots.
- Dylan16807 3mo agoIs climbing over something that happens? For passing by, that says some about the danger of the hobby and much more about the effort of getting the body back. There's lots of common activities where you might pass by a spot someone died while doing it. Notably, driving a car nearly guarantees it.
- dhosek 3mo agoOr taking a walk. There’s an intersection two blocks from me where a pedestrian was killed in a hit and run accident shortly after I moved to town. The roadside memorial remained in place for nearly two years (I remember thinking that the people who lived in the house at the corner where the memorial was would probably like to remove it, but didn’t want to appear callous). The worst part is that even though the intersection has been a 4-way stop for over a decade (the additional stop signs added after the hit and run), I’ve twice nearly been struck by drivers blowing the stop sign after I’ve entered the intersection as a pedestrian.
- yard2010 3mo agoI feel so frustrated about such stuff. Especially when we have the technology to make this not happen.
- notahacker 3mo agoThere aren't any common activities where visible corpses serve to remind you that around 1% of participants don't make it back
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- saghm 3mo agoThere's a pretty stark difference been "someone died in this spot" and them still being there for you to see. Most people don't react nearly as viscerally to hearing that someone died as they do to literally seeing a corpse.
- rich_sasha 3mo agoThe stepping over the dead bothers me little, frankly. As a mountaineer, it's hard to imagine a nicer end than dying at the top of a beautiful mountain. Beats the care home for sure. What horrifies me is the idea of stepping past people who are alive and dying, because... Meh? Because I paid to go the top, not rescue stragglers? People often say they can barely walk forwards, never mind rescue someone, and it's true. But surely if you have any energy left in you, it should go to saving a life. And if it is so touch and go for you, then don't go.
- drakonka 3mo agoDo you think if you're in that kind of situation, where you are dying on a beautiful mountain, you would have it in you to appreciate the beauty around you? I was imagining it to be more like a cold, painful death rather than a nice end where you appreciate the mountain air.
- rich_sasha 3mo agoI don't have definitive first-hand experience. I would speculate that it is one of the less awful ways to go. Mountaineers who had a close brush talk about the struggle to stay awake while awaiting rescue (or before resuming their descent at first light) - because they felt that if they fell asleep, they wouldn't wake up again. If it's like uncomfortable and cold but unshakeable sleepiness, I can think of worse ways to go.
- invalidptr 3mo agoI have firsthand experience with this, and yes, that was my last thought. I was young and foolish, and alone in the wilderness during the winter. I drank some bad water and became very sick during a blizzard, and while searching for shelter, I finally became too weak to continue. I was hypothermic, and coherent thoughts were difficult, but my last thoughts were peaceful acceptance, and appreciation of the beauty and power around me. I cocooned up and drifted off, and I'm still here somehow.
- drakonka 2mo ago
- potamic 3mo agoIn some cases leaving people behind to die as well. https://apnews.com/article/pakistan-porter-death-k2-norwegian-climber-record-51429bae5b1c53a449c360ad42c38153 https://apnews.com/article/pakistan-porter-death-k2-norwegia...
- dhosek 3mo agoBack in the 90s, I went to see an IMAX film about climbing Everest and at the beginning, I was thinking, “I could do this,” but as it continued my view turned into, “I will never do this. This is insane.” What’s really scary now is that it’s turned into something where people have to literally stand in line to reach the summit.
- trhway 3mo agoWith today tech - cameras, drones - the tragedy would unfold like a reality TV. Several months ago a woman broke her leg and stuck as a result at 6800m on Pobeda Peak in Russia and died in several days while the whole country was watching https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbr02F36YdQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbr02F36YdQ
- no-name-here 3mo agoText: https://meduza.io/en/news/2025/09/03/stranded-russian-climber-natalia-nagovitsina-has-died-kyrgyzstan-s-mountaineering-federation-says https://meduza.io/en/news/2025/09/03/stranded-russian-climbe... Link at the bottom has previous update
- throwup238 3mo agoFor context: One climber died and a helicopter crashed trying to rescue her. No one's ever been rescued before at that altitude on that mountain range.
- 21asdffdsa12 3mo agoThere was a video-stream company that got famous live-streaming a technician who fell when dismounting a condor-egg camera.
- verzali 3mo ago... pied piper?...
- TFNA 3mo ago> 6800m on Pobeda Peak in Russia I thought, “There’s no way a peak in Russia can be that high”, and indeed, you got the unit wrong, this is 3,003 m. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_Pobeda_(Sakha) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peak_Pobeda_(Sakha)
- dreamcompiler 3mo agoAs a firefighter/EMT I occasionally have to deal with death, and I will even put myself in somewhat dangerous situations (that I've been trained for, and for which I have appropriate PPE) if there's a chance I can save a life. But putting myself in a situation where the likelihood of dying is quite high for no reason other than to say I did it? No thanks. Nevertheless I'm glad the family of Mr. Morup is no longer wondering what happened to him.
- vasco 3mo agoI mean you do firefighting because you like something about it, maybe the feeling of doing something good. So it should be understandable doing something dangerous for some good internal feeling. Your driving feel good feeling is just different from theirs. The fact you dismissed it to just be "to say they did it" doesn't mean that's how they feel about it. There's ways to be dismissive about being a firefighter too, but they aren't fair.
- lukan 3mo ago"The fact you dismissed it to just be "to say they did it" doesn't mean that's how they feel about it" But they don't do it for other people. They do it, to say they did it. To overcome the challenge, to do what they are good at. The most other people get out of climbing stories is being entertained (or inspired). The most people get out of firefighters work is having their lives saved.
- vasco 3mo agoThis subthread isn't about what is most valuable to the world. It is about what makes someone take risks. One guy's superficial need for adrenaline might still represent a much bigger internal feeling of "I have to do it" than another guys internal feeling of "I like to help others so I do this". Because the firefighter only understands taking risks to do something moral doesn't mean others operate the same way.
- lukan 3mo ago
- DonHopkins 3mo ago[dead]
- prennert 3mo agoFrom what I understand, the queue is not there always. There is a very narrow window in spring during which the ascent is possible, due to weather (enough ice to get over some sections, but weather not leathal). If you go too early you freeze or get blown off in 0 visibility, if you go too late, the ice has thawed too much and you get washed off in the rapids. Sometimes the window is only something like 10 days during which you (and everyone else) have to ascent and descent from basecamp.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- everyone 3mo agoI mean Everest is so gauche also, only rich morons do it.
- nephihaha 3mo agoOther mountains are available. Most of the mountains in Antarctica are unclimbed.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]