Contents [Ski Everest Home] Front page for the Skiing Everest Cybercast [UPDATES] Climbers call from Everest on a sat-phone [The North Side] Climbing guide Eric Simonson describes the Northeast Ridge Route [Meet the Team] The 1997 Everest Ski Expedition members [EVEREST '97] Rich multimedia cybercast from Everest [Sponsors] Companies that supported this effort The Everest Bookstore Click on a book for details and ordering info from The Mountain Zone Bookstore. "Into Thin Air" by Jon Krakauer An epic, first-hand account of the 1996 tragedy. "Everest" by Walt Unsworth Thorough compilation of historic climbs, triumph and tragedy. "Everest Map" by Brad Washburn National Geographic centennial map, Washburn's Everest map and more. "Everest: The West Ridge" by Tom Hornbein The pioneering ascent by Unsoeld and Hornbein. [The Mountain Zone] More stories from The Mountain Zone			Updates From Everest Click here to get the FREE Real Audio Player to hear sat-phone calls. Calonica Air of Uncertainty Thursday, October 2, 1997 (Everest North Face base camp, Tibet) [Click to hear the sat-phone call.] Transcript: Hello, it's Craig Calonica at Everest base camp on the North side, Thursday the 2nd, around 5:15 pm. Calling in to let you know how things are looking. Not much has changed as far as the weather goes. We've been receiving very high winds and very cold weather. The snow that does happen just gets blown away right away. It appears that every team, with the exception of mine — which is not very big — is packing it in and leaving, all within the next five or six days. We're still sitting here waiting to get some kind of idea of what kind of weather window we're going to get here to try to sneak up and do something. At this moment, of course, it's not very promising, just by my standard of predicting weather — and that's day-by-day. We do know that there's some brutal stuff still inbound from Bhutan. It's not here yet, and if it's worse than what we've already seen, that will probably be it. If it dumps a couple feet on the North Col, there will not be any time left to let the snow settle and actually go up there and be safe. It'll pretty much close the door on any climbing in that area. I'm hoping that that won't happen, but what can I say? I'm not in charge of what the big guy upstairs says about what the weather does. I also have the Sherpas to contend with, which are now — they're like a little family here — and when one group leaves, and the other group leaves, the other group wants to leave, and then they all want to leave, and consequentially, although my Sherpas haven't made any kind of big "We want out of here," it's present. But anyway, we'll see. There's other things happening here as well, In the last few days my right eye suddenly started getting a giant, big blur spot, which doesn't make any sense. We have doctors looking at it and they said that in the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours after this medication, if that doesn't improve, I should go to Kathmandu for a couple days and have it checked out seriously and then come back. That doesn't make things look very good. I don't have that much time. So there's a few things in the air right now of uncertainty. I most certainly am not in any way wanting to leave and go away right now, and I will try my best to fulfill my mission and why I came here. But there's not much I can say if there's no way to go up because of the winds. The winds also are stripping away a lot of the snow. And they're keeping all of us down at advance base camp and base camp. Well, we just can't do anything about that, although I have been here many times before and seen good weather all the way through the third week of October. It's the only thing that really gives me something to go on and faith that I will get my window. But I'm not holding my breath. Jim Bridwell decided to leave and he caught the first ride out... I've known him since '71 — he started me climbing and I figured he'd be a good measure to the group... We'll see what happens here. I'll be in touch with you tomorrow. Take it easy. Bye-bye. — Craig Calonica, Expedition Leader PREVIOUS UPDATE | UPDATES HOME | NEXT UPDATE

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