Berg Adventures 2013 Everest Expedition Dispatch

May 16, 2013 – The South Col

Yesterday we reached the South Col a little later than expected due to the high winds. The high winds persisted during the evening and instead of going to the summit, we stayed in our tents. We stayed a full night on Oxygen at 26,000ft. We are hoping tonight as the winds will go down then we will have a chance at 8 o’clock to head to the summit. We talked to our lead climbing Sherpa and we made a decision that if we get to the balcony and the winds are still really high, we will have to turn around. You can’t hear right now but the winds are incredible high here. Anyway, this is what we came for, this is our one shot at the summit and I suppose these next few hours are our final count down to the summit.

– Steve Whittington

Listen to Steve's call

Life at the South Col is not easy, especially in windy conditions.

Looking up the triangular face to the South summit