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Messner's North Face Route

It was actually Edmund Norton, who in 1924 pioneered this route up the "Great Couloir," now commonly known as the Norton Couloir. He managed to climb to the top of the couloir, to an altitude of 28,126 feet (8570 meters) without bottled oxygen. He would hold this altitude record for the next 29 years (depending on how you feel about Mallory and Irvine's final days on the mountain).

Reinhold Messner chose this direct route for his 1980 solo and second oxygenless climb to the summit of Everest. He did so by climbing directly from Advanced Base Camp at 21,000 feet to the summit with one nightime bivouac near the base of the couloir. He thus limited his time in the low-pressure death zone to less than a quarter of the time required to complete the normal progression up the Northeast Ridge.

For a well-bonded team of four climbers progressing two at a time from an established camp on the North Col at 7000m (23,000 feet), we believe this route provides the greatest chance of success and highest margin of safety given the debilitating effects of altitude and the real limits of weather forecasting. We will establish a small fixed camp approximately where Messner set up his 1980 bivouac, a place to rest and refill water bottles.

Ultimately, we take solace in knowing that a central goal of this expedition is to reach Woody Sayre's 1962 high point of 7800m, or 25,500 feet. Should Qomolunga not grant us the conditions to reach her summit, or should our own bodies militate against it, then this goal will provide some measure of completion. And we take little risk that we will be forced to leave anything at all too high and thus unreachable on the mountain.

Above is one of Norman Hanson's photographs from 1962 with our approximate summit route and bivouac point laid out in red. Norm's full 1962 North Face slide show is here. This was the route Sayre planned to climb, and it will be in our minds throughout the entire journey.