Ahead of the 30th anniversary of the 1996 Mount\u00a0Everest disaster, W\u0101naka resident Guy Cotter sat down\u00a0with Ruairi O\u2019Shea\u00a0 to reflect on the tragedy, and the\u00a0lessons learned from a life leading expeditions in one of\u00a0the most hostile places on Earth.<\/p>\n
Thirty years ago this weekend, W\u0101naka\u2019s Guy Cotter watched as a storm rolled toward Mt Everest, and he knew his friends were in danger.<\/p>\n
What followed was one of the most infamous disasters in the history of climbing on the world\u2019s highest peak, with Mr Cotter\u2019s pivotal role in the rescue told in Jon Krakauer\u2019s 1997 best-seller\u00a0Into Thin Air\u00a0and the 2015 blockbuster\u00a0Everest.<\/p>\n
Cotter was a guide for Hall and Ball Adventure Consultants – the mountaineering company founded by Rob Hall and Gary Ball that pioneered guided expeditions to Everest – for the company\u2019s first guided expedition to the mountain\u2019s summit in 1992, as well as for expeditions in 1993, in which the group reached the summit but Cotter did not as he cared for a client, and in 1995, when the group stopped 70m short of the summit due to bad weather and fading light.<\/p>\n
In 1996, expecting his second child, Mr Cotter could not commit to a three-month Everest expedition, so instead led a group of Malaysian climbers on a shorter expedition to Mt Pumori, a smaller peak 8km west of Everest.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018The Adventure Consultants expedition had been in the area for a month or so and when I arrived they were about ready to go to the summit.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018I caught up with them and we had a few meetings and they went off toward the summit.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018It was only a few days later when everything went wrong,\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n
What went wrong was a combination of slow progress by the Adventure Consultants expedition, a decision to continue past a pre-determined turnaround point if the peak could not be reached by a certain time, and a blizzard that hit the mountain while the expedition made its attempt on the summit.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018Back in those days, there was no really good weather forecasting, so you just had to make it up as you went along,\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n
From his vantage point at the base of Mt Pumori, Mr Cotter could see the weather coming in, but it wasn\u2019t a significant concern until he learned how high up the mountain his colleagues remained.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018I looked down the valley from where I was a few kilometres away and saw this big front coming up the valley towards us,\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018The fact that they were relatively late getting down was the problem.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018If they\u2019d managed to get up and down back to the South Col by midday, or even by 5pm, there would have been no problem at all, but because they had various delays going on, they didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018That was hard for me to accept because I\u2019d been there all those years and been instrumental in making the decision to turn around early.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018To hear that they were up there so late was devastating.\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n
In attempting to guide client Doug Hansen safely down the mountain, Cotter\u2019s friend and mentor, Rob Hall had made slow progress.<\/p>\n
When Hansen went missing during the night, Hall continued down the mountain alone, but a frozen regulator on his oxygen mask slowed his progress before frostbitten hands and feet stopped him in his tracks.<\/p>\n
Hall\u2019s last radio communication was patched through to his wife in New Zealand, pregnant with her first child, who he is reported to have told, \u2018\u2018Sleep well, my sweetheart. Please don\u2019t worry too much.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Mr Cotter had been given a radio by Mr Hall to maintain contact, and once he heard how the disaster was developing, he headed to Everest base camp to help the base camp manager and to help co-ordinate the rescue.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018It was very difficult,\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018There were people on the mountain who got involved in helping, and there were people who didn\u2019t pitch in or help at all.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018There was the whole cross-section of humanity, and all of its good and bad sides came out at that point,\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n
In total, 12 people lost their lives in the disaster, including Rob Hall, New Zealander and Adventure Consultants guide Andy Harris, and Adventure Consultants clients Doug Hansen and Yasuko Nasamba.<\/p>\n
New Zealand has left an indelible mark on Mount Everest, and while you might be well-versed in Sir Edmund Hillary\u2019s ascent, you might not know about the role of New Zealanders, and Adventure Consultants – the now W\u0101naka-based business led by Cotter – in pioneering guided expeditions up the mountain.<\/p>\n
In 1990, its founders – Rob Hall and Gary Ball – summitted Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary\u2019s son Peter, with a view to taking guided expeditions up the mountain.<\/p>\n
Cotter, who grew up in the mountains and first climbed Mount Cook via the technical East Ridge aged 17, before guiding expeditions in Alaska and the Himalayas, was offered the opportunity to come on board as a third guide.<\/p>\n
For Cotter, then in his late 20s, it was an incredible opportunity to reach the summit of the world\u2019s highest peak, and to learn about the expedition business.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018It was great for me because even though I was a strong climber, Himalayan climbing required so much more in the way of administration, politics, strategies and logistics, so it wasn\u2019t just about the climbing anymore.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
When it\u2019s put to Mr Cotter that Adventure Consultants pioneered the commercialisation of Everest – a phrase which evokes modern images of long queues to reach the summit – he gently disagrees, pointing to the commercial nature of early Everest expeditions reliant on commercial sponsors.<\/p>\n
We settle on democratised as a fairer description.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018What Hall and Ball did was to guide it, and that enabled every man and woman to get to Everest.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018Prior to that, it was very exclusive and elite.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018You had to be either a national team, or you had to be part of a sponsored team that was usually pulling in all of the best climbers from one country to go on these expeditions, so it was actually very, very difficult for people to get access to Everest,\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n
Nothing is guaranteed on Everest, but the guided expeditions offered by Hall and Ball Adventure Consultants – as the business was then known – were immediately successful, with clients reaching the summit on the first three expeditions, and getting within 70m of the summit on the fourth expedition in 1995.<\/p>\n
With Rob Hall\u2019s death in 1996 following Gary Ball\u2019s death of high-altitude pulmonary edema on the world\u2019s seventh-highest peak Dhaulagiri in 1993, Mr Cotter purchased the remnants of Adventure Consultants from Mr Hall\u2019s wife.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018I didn\u2019t know whether it was going to be the right move, or whether I should rebrand, but in the end I decided to carry on with the Adventure Consultants brand in respect of my mentors,\u2019\u2019 Cotter said.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018There were some pros and cons, and there were some negative connotations because of what happened in 1996, but in the end it was an easy decision.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Cotter said that the coronavirus pandemic – and a regulatory environment making it more and more difficult to run expeditions in New Zealand – means that the domestic side of the business is lying dormant, but the international side, taking clients to the Earth\u2019s extremes like Everest or the poles, is still going strong.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018When I look back, Rob and Gary were pioneers.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u2018Pioneers frequently reach the parameters of the activity that they\u2019re working in, but doing that helps to establish how that activity should be operated going forward,\u2019\u2019 Mr Cotter said.<\/p>\n