At 3 p.m. on May 24th Marty Schmidt reached the summit of Makalu. "An incredible route to the summit of Makalu, there's not one easy way up... four major ridges... the normal French route is quite challenging... I went solo to the top," Marty said in a phone call.

This was a fitting end to a great adventure. Marty earned this summit. It was not an easy trip. Throughout April, we suffered set back after set back. Our original objective, the unclimbed South Buttress, was in terrible shape, shedding tons of rock a day. The only thing that saved us was the overhanging upper lip of a monstrous crevasse which sent the rocks ricocheting a few feet over our heads.

Not wanting to die, we were chased toward the safety of the SE Ridge. Enroute, Marty fell in a crevasse. The weather worsened. Hurricane force winds kept us pinned in our tents. We spent the nights bracing the tent poles with our bodies. The only sheltered spot we could find was in a giant crevasse, where the wind funneled the snow into our tent, making it nearly impossible to cook or melt snow. April was a miserable month for climbing. In our first five weeks, we had about 4 hours of great weather.

Our progress was made worse by the shear massive nature of Makalu. The route from our ABC to the SE Ridge was over 1300 meters (4000 feet). That's a lot of climbing just to get to the real climbing, especially for a heavily loaded small team. In April the slopes of the SE Ridge were blue ice. A slip on 35 degree slopes would be fatal. This forced us to fix ropes where we didn't plan for them. We spent a super cold day stretching hundreds of meters of rope from rock outcrop to rock outcrop, reaching 7000 meters. At our high point, late in the day, we left gear for the next day. That night the hurricane force winds returned. We reluctantly returned to base camp. 

Bad weather forecast followed bad forecast. In base camp, books were read. Yoga sessions filled the mornings. We visited our Ukrainian friends (they succeeded in pioneering a major variation on the West Face, with three team members reaching the summit) and our British friends (they sadly did not reach the top, despite an amazing effort and phenomenal team).

We finally saw a weather window: it looked like May 6th was a summit day. Marty and I spent a night in ABC. The next morning, we climbed to our crevasse camp. Everything looked good. But that night the winds returned. We hunkered down for a day. Finally, the weather broke. We loaded all our gear into our packs, and headed onto the SE Ridge. It was a cold, but beautiful morning, turning into a cold, windy and cloudy afternoon. We had to get to 7200 meters and we had ropes fixed to 7000 meters. At noon, I was breaking trail, pulling ropes from knee deep snow. Our pace was painfully slow.

"What do you think?" Marty asked. At our pace, we would never make the 7200 meter camp today.

We turned back, dropping to the col on the SE Ridge. The Brits had a tent there. As we approached the tent, descending through a cloud, we picked out the shapes of four British climbers coming up the ridge. We camped next to each other, in the only place that was safe from crevasses and the fearsome overhangs of 15-20 meter wide cornices.

The winds tore at the tent all night. The snow piled up. By morning, the drifting snow nearly buried the tents. Marty and I climbed out to shovel the snow.

That's when the first symptoms hit me. I was terribly short of breath, and bending over made things much worse. I crawled back in the tent and noticed my hands were marble white: no blood was flowing to the fingers. For some reason I was horribly hypoxic. What was causing the oxygen starvation? I'd suffered bronchitis on Lhotse (and summited), an upper respiratory infection on Everest (and summited), but this was very different. Weird symptom followed weird symptom: chills, fevers, shortness of breath, and cramps in legs, elbows and shoulders. But the worse was the tightening of my chest.

One of the Brits was a doc. He crawled into the tent, using our collective tiny first aid kits, and his training, to gather data. We called docs at Johns Hopkins. There were a few possible causes: from Pneumonia to a Pulmonary Embolism (with Deep Vein Thrombosis causing the cramps). Pulmonary Embolism in our situation was the scariest possibility and required an immediate evacuation. 

We called Global Rescue , who was providing our team with medical evacuation services. The team there was amazing, getting a helicopter with a rescue team positioned. We had a tiny window, just past dawn, when the weather might allow for an evac. The rescuers planned to "long-line" me from the mountain, flying directly to our camp at 6700 meters, clipping me into the end of rope, and flying to safety. If successful, it would be the second highest rescue ever. If unsuccessful.....

Marty and the Brits prepared the zone, including marking out a potential landing zone. The sat phone rang, saying the chopper was in the air. We waited. The phone rang again. The weather between us and Lukla had socked in. No helicopter could make it in those conditions. 

We shouldered our packs. It was time to descend the SE Ridge: two thousand meters of down climbing, along a knife edged ridge. The Brits and Marty guided, prodded and encouraged me to keep going. Ten hours later we stumbled into the Brits' base camp. Along the way our team grew into a parade. Ram and Theo met us at ABC. To guide us in the dark (and through the falling snow), the Brits and their Sherpas came out with lights, hot drinks and strong backs to carry packs. 

The Brit's doc gave me a good once over in base camp. He ruled out an embolism (which was really ruled out by the fact that I didn't go into cardiac arrest on the descent).

The next morning, the chopper arrived, whisking me away to Kathmandu and the CIWEC clinic. The city was shut down by a Maoist instigated strike. Luckily I was traveling by ambulance: one of the few vehicles allowed on the roads.

After a battery of tests, I flew home. Marty was left to salvage our gear and our expedition. He switched from the SE Ridge to the NW Ridge (the normal route). And he reached the summit. He earned that moment.

I could not imagine a better partner than Marty Schmidt. He is clearly strong and motivated, but more importantly when I needed a self-less partner, he cared for me.

A successful life is not measured in accomplishments, it's measured in relationships. Marty and I went to Makalu because we wanted to climb together. We wanted our 20 year friendship to grow through a shared adventure. Our team grew to include an amazing support team in base camp:  Ashley Gateless, Theo Linder, Giannina Cantale, Ram Chandra Suunuwar and Jenga Sherpa. And as our expedition unfolded, we became close friends with the Ukrainian and British teams. The partnerships we forged made the trip successful and satisfying.

We cannot thank our partners enough. Our trip, which ended so differently than we expected, was an amazing life experience.

-Chris Warner

View a brief video of Chris' aided decent with the British team here.

P.S. Marty should be back in Kathmandu in a week. He then heads to Pakistan to attempt Gasherbrum 1 and 2. Chris is still battling with his illness, but getting better.