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Team Just Below the Balcony
South Col - Monday, May 22, 2000  2:30am Nepal Time

DISPATCHES

Henke

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Hi Mountain Zone, this is Ellie Henke calling in from Alpine Ascents Base Camp. It's been about four hours since the last time we called in, four hours ago, about 9:30pm, our time.

The climbing party of Willi, Vernon and Al and about seven of the Sherpas took off from Camp IV at the South Col. They've been working their way up. We just heard a brief call from Willi, it was hard to hear him because apparently they're getting radio interference from China. But Dawa relayed through from Camp II and it sounds like they're still below the Balcony but doing well.

Here at Base Camp we've had clouds and snow for most of the night, but finally about a half an hour ago it started clearing and we can see up the mountain. And Dawa confirms that it's fairly warm at Camp II and also clearing and we've got a good moon out. So hopefully the climbing team is fairly comfortable and is just taking their time and working their way on up the mountain.

So here at Base Camp we're gathered in the communications tent; we've got a good heater going, we've got a couple good lamps so we've got good light. And we're sitting here drinking milk tea and eating Pringles potato chips. So we're pretty comfortable here although we're trying to stay awake. For us here right now it's about 2:20 in the morning so we have our vigil going and are pulling hard for the folks up on the mountain.

So that's about it from Base Camp and I'll call in again when I have updated information from the climbing team. So this is Base Camp signing off.

— Ellie Henke, Alpine Ascents and MountainZone.com Correspondent

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