Daily Dispatches
Satellite phone updates from the 1998 American Everest Expedition
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Wally Berg
Setting Out for Camp III
Tuesday, April 28, 1998 — Base Camp (17,500')

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Camp III at 23,500' on the Lhotse Face
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(photo: Burleson)
Hi Mountain Zone, it's Wally Berg calling you from base camp the evening of April 28th. As I may of mentioned, tomorrow morning I'll leave to go through the Khumbu Icefall, and to go up to Camp II (21,000') to spend a few nights there and above to further acclimatize. In particular, this will be the trip when myself and the entire climbing team will go to spend a couple of nights at Camp III (23,500') which is always sort of a hard hit in terms of acclimatization, but we believe it's a very necessary one for anyone who has business going any higher on the mountain at subsequent stages of the expedition.

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Dave Mencin went to climb Island Peak and contracted some kind of dreadful illness that keeps him from talking very clearly, and sounds like on the radio from Pheriche, where he is now, sounds like he is pretty congested as well.

So I'll leave early in the morning, and Dave may not be back at base camp for a while — a couple of days — taking the rest he needs in Pheriche. The base camp will be in the very capable hands of the Sherpa staff, specifically under the sirdar Pasang and the head cook, Chungba, but it may mean a couple days gap in direct communication to the Mountain Zone. We'll certainly continue to endeavor to get up this peak; get a route established; get ourselves fit. We'll continue to make GPS observations and record data at the lower camps, and we'll have stories to tell when we come back down, or when Dave shows up in a couple of days.

Wally Berg, Expedition Leader

[editor's note: stay tuned for daily features to continue with multimedia, photos, and detailed descriptions of the camps and route.]

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