Page 19 - 2006/07 AMA Winter

On the approach to advance base cap. throughoutbutwillnowfocus
p|rovedtobeabsolutelykeyto |pulling together what proved 1to be the most incredible team and meant that no one was s:electedpurelyontheirclimb­ ing background and ability to impress in a 20 minute inter­ view.
Lead climbing on the French spur.
applytoeverythingandwas achieved by selecting the right quality person to each task. This long period required hugecommitmentfromthose selected and from the many people who lay on the periph­ ery supporting us and for any­ one wishing to undergo such a large project I would empha­ sise the importance to not underestimate what you are going into.
With 3 busy years behind us everything was in place and off we flew to Kathmandu then Tibet and Everest North side base camp where we spent a few days acclimatising prior to pushing forward to our own Base Camp at Tilman’s Camp where we would operate from for the next 8-10 weeks. The logistical movement of the equipment and team, which now included Sherpa's, mem­ bers and a film crew, was complex and required some diplomacy with the local authorities but worked well. We had chosen to make life at our base as comfortable as possible for the times we were resting and whilst on the
mountain our equipment needed to be the best avail­ able to give us the best chance of success - hence 3 yakmovesofapprox70yaks each time to get us estab­ lished at Tilman’s Camp.
The first few weeks on the mountain then became a peri­ od of exploration and truly hard graft rotating the lead and pushing forward through Camp One and on up the first major obstacle of the 1300m steep French Spur. A new star came to light under the guid­ ance of John Doyle as Paul Chiddle on his first Himalayan trip powered up many of the technically hard sections lay­ ing ropes for the other mem­ bers to move the huge amount of equipment into place. This period saw set­ backs with extreme weather which lost us some days of forward movement but ulti­ mately the team leapt forward at every opportunity making up for the loss even when the weather was marginal. With the Spur completed we gained a major confidence boost having comfortably
on the Main Team which was
quickly attracting some very
high calibre talent. We had
decided, mainly through
John’s suggestion as Training
Manager and Climbing
Leader, that our selection pro­
cess, in order to gain the very
strongest and most ‘compati­
ble’ team, would not just d>eparture of the expedition
involve personal climbing CVs and a short interview but it would also have a period where we would select a squad from our applicants and train together before making the final team selection - this
was just short of 3 years and proved to be the right amount of time to organise the high quality expedition we aimed to achieve. The ground breaking element came with the ‘atten­ tion to detail’ we were able to
Jugging up the fixed rope on the French spur carrying a heavy load.
Slow progress along a windswept west ridge between camps 3 and 4 just below 8000m.
From the birth of the idea to
ARMY MOUNTAINEER 17