Burleson

Click to hear Todd Burleson's audio dispatch recorded over sat-phone.
From Burleson's Satellite Call:
Hi, it's Todd for The Mountain Zone. It's May 11th. We're all back in Base Camp, and doing well. The weather is quite nice in Base Camp and looks nice all around, but we've been getting weather forecasts of very, very high winds for the next several days. [Click here to see the last 5-day weather forecast.]

The only team on the mountain right now is a couple of Canadians in Camp II [21,500'] hoping for some major change, but I imagine they'll be coming down soon. Everything else in base is quite good. I wish we were moving up the mountain -- everybody is getting a little antsy. I'm not sure what some of the other teams are doing, but some new weather forecasts will be translated around, and I hear rumors some people may leave. So it may reduce the number of people that go for summit at that particular time. Could be very crowded on this year's summit day.

We do have some news from the north side -- it's not very good. The Khazakstan party that went up -- several of them summited, and five people died on the descent. [ed. note: latest sources suggest seven deaths from the north face team: 3 from Khazakstan, 1 from Korea, 1 from Germany,1 Sherpa from Nepal, and one of undetermined origin. They were caught in a severe storm 200 meters below the summit. Update: Later Reports Confirmed Five (Not Seven) Dead -- see update from May 13 for more information.] Three of them are Khasaks, one is a Sherpa who fell down the Great Couloir, and one is Peter Kowalzik -- he is a guide for IMC, International Mountain Climbing, a German company. So, some very, very bad news from the north side.

I guess that's about it for right now. Talk to you soon. Bye.

-- Todd Burleson, Expedition Leader