Mt. Everest 2005: Alpine Ascents Everest 2005: SUMMIT! 9:40

Update: June 2 SUMMIT! 9:40
    
SUMMIT! It’s official. The first people of our team to arrive at the summit of Chomalungma were Jose Luis Peralvo, Esther Colwill, Mingma Tsering Sherpa, and Nima Nuru Sherpa. They stepped onto the top of the world at 7:37 this morning. Shortly after Dave Morton and Danielle Fisher arrived, and by 8:50 everyone was standing on the top, including Tony Van Marken, Lakpa Rita Sherpa, Kami Rita Sherpa, Tsheri Sherpa, and Tshering Dorjee Sherpa. Once again cheers went up throughout our base camp and congratulations went out to the summiters. Words of advice from Willi were,” Congratulations! Now take your pictures and get yourselves out of there. The weather seems to be ok for now, but everyone is concerned that the winds might pick up again. We will be happy to see everyone safe down to the south Col. However the word here in base camp is that we may not wait until the team comes down to raise a beer in their honor!

Also on a side note, another Russian MI17 helicopter crashed this morning in base camp (the last one was in 2003). The good news is that it stayed upright and the pilot was able to shut it down right away. People were shook up, but the word from the docs is that no one was injured. The big concern at this point is that it had passengers coming up from Kathmandu who are not acclimatized to this elevation. The helipad at base camp is now out of commission so the plan is to have them walk to Gorak Shep where another helicopter can pick them up. Today is their lucky day – it could have been much worse.

Ellie

Add On (Typed in while waiting for the team to traverse to the summit):
From the Balcony to the South Summit:
2000 – radio call from the Balcony was at 4:30am; 10:45 am team turned around at the South Summit (did not summit) - about 6 hours.
2002 - radio call from the Balcony was at 2:45; arrived at the South Summit at 8:30am – also about 6 hours.
2003 - no radio call from the Balcony; everyone at the South Summit at 9:45.
2004 - radio call from the Balcony was at 4:40am; everyone at the South Summit at 7:30am - an amazing 3 hours (this team was really strong).
2005 – first summit team on May 30-31 – called from the Balcony at 7:30; arrived at South Summit at 9:30 – 2 hours, by this time they were moving really fast.
2005 – second summit team on June 1-2 called from the Balcony at 3:00am, and reached the South Summit at 6:30am – 3:30 hours.

And the actual summit times:
2000 – no summit
2002 - first to summit: 10:30am; last to summit: 11:18am
2003 – first to summit: 12:15pm; last to summit: 1:00pm
2004 – first to summit: 9:00 am; last to summit: 9:45am
2005 – May 31 everyone to summit: 11:35am
2005 - June 2 – first to summit: 7:37am; last to summit: 8:50pm

Dispatches

Vern Tejas, Willi Prittie, Dave Morton, Jose Luis Peralvo, and Lakpa Rita Sherpa will lead the Alpine Ascent team on Everest this Spring. They will attempt the standard South East ridge route.

GUIDE STAFF (BIOS)
Lakpa Rita Sherpa Senior Guide & Sirdar	Vern Tejas Senior Guide	Willi Prittie Senior Guide
Dave Morton Senior Guide	Jose Luis Peralvo Senior Guide	Ellie Henke Base Camp Manager
CLIMBERS
Nigel Clark	Esther Colwill	Ron Farb
Kevin Grant	Cathy Groninger	Kent Groninger
Mostafa Mahmoud	Jeanne Stawiecki	Dianette Strange-Wells
Tony Van Marken	David Liano	Danielle Fisher

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