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Epic Moro
Base Camp - Wednesday, April 19, 2000

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Editor's Note: The following interview was emailed from Everest Base Camp by Dan Morrison, Quokka Sports/MountainZone.com Everest correspondent.

	Boukreev & Moro photo: Boukreev

On Christmas Day of 1997, Anatoli Boukreev was swept to his death on Annapurna. With him on the rope was Italian mountaineer Simone Moro. Now at Mount Everest Base Camp, Moro recalls the fatal accident.

"I remember very well his eyes until the moment he disappeared. It is difficult, but not so much to speak of this accident, because fortunately or unfortunately after the accident, I spent three or four days trying to survive. Probably this time forced me to carry on after this terrible moment.

"And I only can tell you that the decision to climb a new route Annapurna side and not the original Bonington route on South Face of Annapurna, we take because everyday we saw there were many avalanches on the South Face. From the East Face of Annapurna avalanches never came down.

"I don't know how I survived. I fell from 6,300 meters, and I landed at 5,500.

"I was climbing with a very long fixed rope. Boukreev had stopped to control the rope, when he finished coiling the rope, he put together another one, and I continued to climb. And when I was fifty meters before the ridge we finished the rope. And I discovered this cornice because it was impossible to see from below. After that he started to jumar up, and it was very cold because it was winter, and on the East Face, and sun slowly begins.

"And to spend time I took the video camera to film him, But it was difficult with big gloves so I took off the gloves, and was filming him, for a few seconds, 30 seconds, then my hands became frozen.

"I turned, and I put the camera in the sack. I took again my gloves, and I was looking up and I saw the cornice collapse. And I remember I called with all my voice, 'Anatoli!' And I remember very well his face and his eyes. And he tried to traverse very quickly outside the direction of the avalanche.

"And after, without gloves, I took the fixed rope that I put a few minutes before, I fell down I believe the first 100-200 meters with the rope in my hands. Burning through my skin and my tendons.

"And after I remember also the rope broke, and I was flying. I remember everything. I never lost consciousness. When I landed I remember that I had no jacket, nothing. I was losing blood from my face and my hands. And I was also injured on my right leg.

"I called Anatoli for 10 minutes, not more, I can tell you sincerely. Because I immediately understood that... somebody was dead. When you call Anatoli and he don't answer after 10 minutes, you understand... It was a miracle that I was alive. And it was realistic that he was dead.

"I saw something on this avalanche. I went there and I found one piece of his rucksack.

"And from that moment I had so many lucky moments. The first lucky moment I was alive. Second, I didn't break anything. Third, I landed 50 meters from my last tent. Fifty meters. Fourth, inside this tent I had an extra jacket and gloves. Fifth, I didn't lose my crampons. Even if I was unable to use my hands, I trust in my ability to climb down.

"From that moment, I don't know how, I put all my best to climb down from that face. In the most steeper places, I fell down, I was looking for very deep snow places, and I would jump. I remember, 20, maybe 30-meter jumps.

"But I remember also it was very difficult to leave that place. To make the decision, okay, now I go down. Because I had to admit, Anatoli is dead, and now I must go down. This was very difficult.

"And another difficulty was, when I arrived at the base of the face, fortunately, I believed I would find all the tracks in the glacier already. But they were all covered with snow. I was losing blood, it took all my effort to arrive at the base, and I still had five or six kilometers to go.

"And so I walked three steps, maybe four steps, no more. I remember very well. And after the first kilometer, second kilometer, I was completely exhausted. Probably also from losing blood. I tried to count from one to 10 and oblige myself to wake up. But when I arrived at 10, I didn't wake up. So I changed the system and counted from 10 to zero. And I said, okay, you have to wake up, you have to wake up, you have to wake up. Many times.

"I wake up, make three steps, and sit down. And when you walk three steps and sit down and you have seven kilometers, you lose your motivation. But I kept going. And in the night I arrived at Base Camp. And I was lucky again.

"We were without a satellite phone. Without anything. We had only one cook in Base Camp. No staff, no Sherpas. And before our climb, I told our cook in these words, 'Please go down, because we will stay 10 days on the face of the mountain. So it is stupid that you stay here.

"So in my head, I knew that nobody was in the Base Camp. But it wasn't so. Because I called and somebody answered me. And he cooked some tea, because he didn't understand he had to run to me. And came very smiling. And when he saw only me, and when he saw my face, he immediately understood. And he helped me to arrive in Base Camp.

"But in that moment I said, okay, I am alive, and now I can drink something. But it was still not finished. Because we arrived in Base Camp by helicopter. And there was four meters of fresh snow. So it was impossible to go down to the valley. And I told the cook, 'Okay, you have to go down to open the route.' The village was three days' walking distance. And in that village there was one phone. 'And you have to call this number, 418890.' I remember. It was the number of Nima, my friend at the trekking agency. And the cook said okay. But then I remembered he couldn't read or write. So I had to teach him to write the number.

"He ran down to the village in 17 hours, and he took the note to the man of the telephone and said 'I have to call.' And the man said, "The telephone is broken. And the next telephone is three days' away.' And at that moment I had even more luck. Many angels were working for me.

"Because in that village was the office of the National Park. This office had no phone, but it had one radio. And every morning, early in the morning, this office had one contact with Kathmandu. But that day it was very late. So he ran to this office and told them what had happened. But voice by voice the news arrived to my friend Nima, that we need one helicopter.

"And my friend spent one hour thinking, that everybody is dead. You have to realize that in Nepal you have to spend $4,000 or $5,000 to move a helicopter. It's a big budget. Also, if the news is that everybody is dead, then you don't need a helicopter.

"But this friend, I don't know why, but he didn't believe in this news, and he said, 'Okay, I want to send one helicopter up high.' But I told you it was the middle of the day. There was no pilot who wanted to fly so late. So, even more luck was that there was a cousin of this man who was a private pilot and he accepted the flight. Everybody said, 'Tomorrow we fly.' But my friend said, 'No, tomorrow will be too late.'

"And I remember I was in a sleeping bag, and it was around 2:30 in the afternoon, I heard the helicopter. And I was worried, because I said, 'Probably I have become crazy.' Because I knew very well that helicopters can fly only until about 10 o'clock and not later. And I heard this helicopter and I thought I had become crazy. But then, no, no, it was a helicopter.

"And when I opened the door and saw this helicopter, without shoes or socks I ran and jumped on. And from that moment I was saved."

After having micro-surgery in Kathmandu to repair the tendons in his hand, Moro took another helicopter flight back to the scene of the avalanche. "In my mind, I believed that Anatoli had survived and had gotten to the tent and found my extra jacket. We flew there but we didn't see anything. And after that I returned to Italy."

When asked why he still climbs after such an ordeal, he turns philosophical. "The avalanche killed already two persons, Anatoli, and Dimitri the cameraman. If I stopped climbing, it means that the avalanche killed also me. So it killed all our ambitions, our love of the mountains. And the avalanche can't win."

— Dan Morrison, Quokka Sports/MountainZone.com Everest Correspondent

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