- 1 hour ago
A 19-year-old kid kneels in the snow, holding a radio for a dying man whose arms don't work anymore. This is how the deadliest day in Sherpas' history on Everest happened and how cheap that day turned out to be.
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Watch More:
Everest's Sherpa Betrayal Is Worse Than We Thought
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzjOxvnwUS8
Top 6 Worst Deaths at Niagara Falls in Human History
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIXFldju2Fg
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-------------------------------------------------------------
Watch More:
Everest's Sherpa Betrayal Is Worse Than We Thought
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzjOxvnwUS8
Top 6 Worst Deaths at Niagara Falls in Human History
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIXFldju2Fg
-------------------------------------------------------------
More eXtreme Stories - Subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/@TheExtreme-Edge
For business inquiries only - extremeedgeinfo@gmail.com
Voiceover: https://jessegvoiceactor.com/
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TravelTranscript
00:00A 19-year-old kid kneels in the snow, holding a radio for a dying man whose arms don't work
00:05anymore.
00:06It's April 18th, 2014, 6.45am, high in the Khumbu Icefall.
00:13Kashi Sherpa can't move.
00:15The freezing air is so thick with pulverized ice that climbers around him can barely breathe.
00:21His legs are pinned.
00:23The only thing still working is his voice.
00:25And his 19-year-old brother-in-law, Shuang Sherpa, kneeling next to him, has to press the button on
00:32his radio just so Kashi can gasp three words into the microphone.
00:37Please save me.
00:39Two dozen other men are buried somewhere on the ice around him right now.
00:43Some of them are never going to get the chance to say anything at all.
00:47But this is only the beginning, because this disaster is about to spark outrage across Nepal's mountaineering industry and push
00:55the very men who keep Everest running to finally say, enough is enough.
01:00This is how the deadliest day in Sherpa's history on Everest happened and how cheap that day turned out to
01:06be.
01:07Welcome to the extreme edge, where the stakes are high, but nobody's, just a headline.
01:12To understand how Kaji ended up pinned to the ice, gasping into that radio, we have to go back 45
01:19minutes to the moment one man heard a sound, and nobody else did.
01:23A thin, high whine, like a mosquito, trapped inside his ear.
01:28Except, there's nothing there to swat away, just that same needling buzz over and over.
01:34His people called it Kan Runu, the crying ear.
01:3829-year-old Nirma Chiring, at that point, was 19,000 feet above sea level, right in the middle of
01:45one of the most terrifying places on Earth, the Khumbu Icefall.
01:50A massive, frozen river of ice pouring 2,000 feet down into nothing.
01:56And because it's always moving, the ice is constantly ripping apart and opening up into deep, black cracks that can
02:03swallow a man forever.
02:05Before his ears started buzzing, Nirma had almost climbed his way up through there, and was at the last stretch
02:12of this section.
02:13It was a 40-foot wall, straight up.
02:16To get over it, he had to climb three aluminum ladders tied together, end to end, and leaning against the
02:23ice like a staircase with absolutely nothing underneath it.
02:27When he pulled himself over the top, the ground became a narrow shelf of ice about the size of a
02:34small dining room, and it was packed with more than a hundred men standing shoulder to shoulder in the dark.
02:40They also had 80 to 100 pound packs strapped to their backs, and they were just waiting.
02:47A hundred men, one narrow ledge, and nowhere to go but up into the thing hanging over their heads.
02:54Just past this ledge, the trail dropped down again.
02:58To keep going, these climbers had to climb down using another set of ladders, but the metal pieces holding those
03:05ladders to the ice had come loose during the night.
03:08Nima was in the middle of that big crowd when he looked up, and for the first time that morning,
03:13he got really, really scared.
03:16Right above them, exactly where they were standing while they waited, was this huge, bulging block of solid ice, over
03:24a hundred feet tall, clinging to the side of the mountain.
03:28It was literally the size of a Beverly Hills mansion, and weighed over 30 million pounds, just...waiting.
03:36And just as Nima looked at it, he heard that sound.
03:39They arrived so close together, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to put two and two together.
03:44Something was about to happen.
03:46Exactly what?
03:47He had no idea.
03:48But he wasn't going to wait around to find out what it was.
03:52He immediately put on his radio and tried to hail his boss down at base camp, but the signal was
03:58dead.
03:59He switched radio channels, but only managed to get the camp cook instead.
04:04It didn't matter who at that point, somebody needed to hear this.
04:08My ear is crying, he told the cook.
04:11Something bad is going to happen.
04:13I'm going down.
04:14He began heading straight back to base camp with his load.
04:17This massive, 65-pound canister of cooking gas.
04:21It might sound odd, but the upper slopes of Everest don't quite have cooking facilities on standby.
04:28Nima's job that season, as well as the job of hundreds of Sherpas right there on the slope with him,
04:33was to keep the higher camps of Mount Everest stocked with food, fuel, and oxygen so that foreign climbers paying
04:40tens of thousands of dollars could have a comfortable, safe climb later on.
04:45Sure, it doesn't sound fancy, but it pays up to five times the average annual salary of a Nepali worker.
04:51However, money Nima needed to provide a safe future for his wife and family.
04:57But money was the last thing on his mind right now, and as he turned around and started weaving his
05:02way back through that packed, freezing crowd, he began recognizing faces.
05:08He passed 56-year-old Ong Chiri, an old camp cook who had been working on this mountain for over
05:14a decade.
05:15Ong had just promised his family this would be his very last trip up the icefall before retiring.
05:21He saw 25-year-old Purba Ongyal, who had told his sister the exact same thing.
05:27This was his last season.
05:28He saw Dorje Sherpa, this 39-year-old father of four who lived in a dirt-floor stone house, up
05:36there saving his wages so he could buy a home closer to a school for his kids.
05:41Nima looked at these men he knew, and he warned them.
05:44He told them his ear was crying and what it meant.
05:48They had to go down now.
05:50The amazing thing is, as he spoke, word actually started spreading through the crowd, and five guys near the front
05:58agreed with him.
05:59They probably heard that whine, too, and knew it meant trouble.
06:04But for the rest, well, they just straight-up ignored Nima.
06:08And let's take a minute to think about why.
06:12Imagine you're a guy from a tiny village whose entire family's survival depends on this one, short, two-month climbing
06:19window.
06:20If you dump your gear on the ice and walk away just because of a bad feeling, you don't just
06:25lose that day's pay.
06:27You could get fired.
06:28You could get blacklisted by the expedition companies.
06:31If you lose this job, your kids might not go to school next year.
06:35All because of a weird sound.
06:38It just made no sense.
06:40There was no obvious immediate emergency.
06:43And yes, waiting in a traffic jam for a broken ladder to be fixed was annoying.
06:48But this was Everest.
06:49It happens every single season.
06:52The route fixers were already working on it.
06:54It would probably take them, what, 10, maybe 20 minutes tops to bolt the anchors back in?
06:59Then everyone crosses and the day goes on.
07:02And sure, that massive block of ice hanging over their heads was absolutely terrifying to look at.
07:08But it had been hanging there for years.
07:10In fact, a couple of years before, in 2014, a really famous expedition boss named Russell Bryce got so spooked
07:18by that exact same piece of hanging ice that he pulled his entire massive team off the mountain and canceled
07:24their season.
07:25Because he was absolutely convinced this same Ciroc that spooked Nima was going to fall.
07:31But it didn't fall that year or the year after that.
07:35He just lost millions of dollars and dozens of clients over basic paranoia.
07:40So, why would today be any different?
07:43So, many of those climbers just gave Nima a simple, curt answer.
07:48We have pressure to get up there.
07:50We have to go on.
07:51One of them, a man named Mingma Gyaljin, said,
07:54I had clients' gear.
07:57Nima understood.
07:592014 had not been a good season so far.
08:02They had already been dealing with delays due to the weather issues and everyone was way behind schedule.
08:07The expedition bosses down at base camp were breathing down their necks to get those upper camps built right now.
08:14There was simply no time to waste.
08:16So, he and others began to climb down, even as the rest of the men just turned back around to
08:21face the dark,
08:22shivering, waiting for the ladders to be fixed.
08:26For a couple more minutes, it was just another cold, dark morning on the mountain.
08:31Then, at exactly 6.45am, April 18th, 2014,
08:39like a heavy metal hammer hitting a massive bell,
08:42and before anyone could even look up into the dark to see what made that sound,
08:47the sky just caved in on them.
08:49A hurricane-force wall of wind just ripped down onto that tiny ledge out of absolutely nowhere,
08:56slamming into anyone standing in its path hard enough to knock them clean off their feet.
09:02Some of them didn't even get the chance to think.
09:05One second they were standing on that ledge,
09:07the next, everything around them turned white,
09:10like being swallowed by a cloud made of ice hard enough to sting like buckshot the moment it hit bare
09:16skin.
09:18Some Sherpas, like Karna Tamang, dropped to their knees and pressed their faces as hard as they could against the
09:24ice,
09:24bracing themselves.
09:26Others, like Pasang, Dorje, Sherpa, dove behind a loose chunk of ice on the ledge,
09:31squeezing their eyes shut, thinking,
09:34this is it, I am going to die.
09:36The blast was so strong it shattered thermos flasks tucked deep inside Pasang's backpacks and those of the climbers around
09:44him.
09:45It snapped their thick, heavy-duty nylon climbing ropes in half like they were pieces of string.
09:51It picked up loose gear and threw it everywhere.
09:54The tent pole he'd been hauling on his own back came loose and slammed straight into his skull.
09:59A few feet away, flying ice punched a hole clean through another Sherpa's jacket.
10:05For a few terrifying minutes, that entire section of the mountain was completely swallowed in a choking, freezing cloud of
10:13white powder.
10:14You couldn't breathe.
10:15You couldn't see a single inch in front of your face.
10:19Men were just buried alive on their knees in the dark, getting battered by flying, razor-sharp debris.
10:26Pasang Dorje clipped onto the fixed rope, felt the wind grab him and try to rip him straight off the
10:32mountain.
10:33If he hadn't been clipped in, he would have been gone completely, swept away,
10:38exactly like some of the men standing just a few feet away from him.
10:42It was chaos and madness, a fury that seemed to have no end.
10:48And then, just as fast as it hit, silence.
10:52For a few seconds, there was nothing at all.
10:56Just white dust hanging in the air, slowly starting to settle.
11:01Then, one by one, men started pulling themselves up out of the snow.
11:06Coughing, checking if they still had all their limbs,
11:09looking around at what was left of the ledge they'd all been standing on,
11:13packed shoulder to shoulder, less than a minute earlier.
11:16And asking themselves, what on earth happened?
11:20Before anyone could answer, the screaming started.
11:24Men who'd made it were now scrambling across the wreckage, calling out for the guy who'd been standing right next
11:30to them 30 seconds ago.
11:32Guys who had three-month-old babies waiting for them back in their villages.
11:37Just gone.
11:38Now, Mount Everest pulls in millions of dollars every single year just from climbing permits,
11:44so you'd assume that kind of money buys a real, official emergency system trained and ready to scramble the second
11:51disaster strikes.
11:52But there wasn't one.
11:54Not for the men doing the actual heavy lifting, at least.
11:57So the men who were still standing on that ledge became the rescue team themselves.
12:02They dug at the frozen debris with their bare hands.
12:05They used ice axes if they had them, digging, pulling, and screaming names into the white powder that just didn't
12:13answer back.
12:14Somewhere in that chaos, 19-year-old Shuang Sherpa, on his very first season on the mountain,
12:20found his own brother-in-law, Kaji Sherpa.
12:23Kaji was also clipped to a fixed rope, but the heavy wind had cut his rope and tossed him aside
12:29like a ragdoll into this deep crack on the side of the mountain.
12:33Shuang dragged him out of the crack with his own two hands.
12:36He reached into his backpack for his thermos and poured hot tea down Kaji's throat,
12:42just trying to shock his lungs into breathing right again.
12:45And when Kaji finally came to, he couldn't move his arms.
12:50Shuang had to lean down and press the radio button for him, just so Kaji could gasp out those three
12:56words to base camp.
12:58Please save me.
13:00Down at base camp, everyone heard that loud bang.
13:04And when they couldn't reach anyone on the radio, they knew something had gone horribly wrong.
13:09An expedition boss named Lakpa Rita had sent over 20 of his own men up that morning.
13:14He didn't even wait for confirmation.
13:16He started climbing into the icefall before any official word even reached the camp.
13:22On his way up, he kept passing wounded men limping down the trail, faces covered in blood.
13:28Sometimes he would stop and offer to help them get down, but every single one of them waved him off.
13:34They just pointed up the mountain and told him,
13:36The guys higher up need more help than us.
13:38By the time Lakpa Rita finally reached the impact zone, there were already 50 Sherpas there ahead of him,
13:45just tearing at the ice and snow in fury and fear,
13:50calling desperately for names they were literally climbing with hours earlier.
13:54Lakpa was a typical Nepali man who was stoic on most days,
13:58but when he saw the scale of this disaster, he just sat down right there in the snow next to
14:05the tarp and started crying.
14:08Because what happened up here wasn't some freak, unpredictable act of God that nobody could have seen coming.
14:14Every single man on that mountain, every guide, cook, or expedition boss like Lakpa Rita knew this exact thing was
14:23going to happen.
14:24They had literally been looking right at it day after day, season after season.
14:30To understand what I mean, one thing you should know about Everest is that this mountain isn't built like a
14:35triangle.
14:36It gently slopes upward.
14:38It forms these massive sheer cliffs of glacial ice.
14:42And the thing about glaciers is that they're not just frozen rocks permanently stuck to a mountain.
14:48They're incredibly heavy, very slow-moving rivers of solid ice that are constantly being pushed downhill by their own weight.
14:57And as that river of ice gets pushed over the edge of a steep drop,
15:02huge chunks of it start to bulge out over the empty air.
15:05They just hang there.
15:07Climbers call them cirrocks.
15:09Sounds fancy, but in reality, they are ticking ice bombs clinging to the side of a cliff that can fall
15:16at any moment.
15:18And high up, directly above that very section of the icefall, was a total monster.
15:24It was a bulging cliff of solid ice over 100 feet tall that weighed roughly 30 million pounds,
15:31right over a place climbers have no choice but to pass.
15:35Every single time a Sherpa strapped a heavy gas canister or a bundle of tents to his back
15:41and climbed up into the icefall, he had to walk directly underneath it.
15:47Imagine every time you had to go to work, you had to cross a groaning, frozen ceiling the size of
15:53a Beverly Hills mansion
15:54hanging right over your head, and you can literally hear it groaning.
15:59You can hear it cracking and popping as the ice shifts.
16:03Every single person on Everest knew, with absolute certainty, that eventually, gravity was going to win.
16:10It was never a question of, if that 30 million pound block of ice was going to snap off and
16:16fall.
16:17It was only a question of when.
16:19The terrifying, unspoken question had always been,
16:23who is going to be standing underneath it when the clock finally runs out?
16:28On April 18th, 2014, Everest had finally given its answer.
16:33After the tears, Lachpa Rita got straight back to work.
16:37He grabbed an ice axe off the ground and started digging alongside everyone else.
16:42Around him, 50 other men were doing the exact same thing as well,
16:47tearing at broken ice and packed snow with axes,
16:50hauling chunks the size of coolers off to the side,
16:53stopping every few seconds just to listen,
16:55in case anyone buried underneath was still able to answer back.
16:59Nobody radioed up, asking if backup was on the way.
17:03There was no backup.
17:04Not for the men doing this kind of work.
17:07By about 8.30am,
17:09word had reached everyone down at base camp on what happened up there,
17:12and the place had turned into something it was never built to be.
17:16Doctors from half a dozen different expeditions dropped what they were doing
17:20and gathered at a single medical tent.
17:23Someone converted a dining tent normally used for serving hot meals
17:27to paying clients into an emergency room instead,
17:30and expedition teams gathered around to send helicopters up there.
17:34The first helicopters showed up a couple of hours after the ice came down,
17:39but they were small and not built for these altitudes.
17:42Even worse, there was no place to land.
17:45So, the pilots had to do something incredibly dangerous.
17:49They flew their choppers directly over the impact zone,
17:53fighting the biting winds,
17:54and just hovered in mid-air.
17:57They opened the side doors and dropped the long,
18:00heavy rescue lines straight down to the men on the ice.
18:03Down in the wreckage,
18:04Lachparita and the men there carefully strapped the few survivors
18:08who couldn't walk into harnesses,
18:10gave the signal,
18:11and watched as the helicopter hoisted them up into the sky
18:15and carried them down to the medical tents at base camp.
18:18Then, the helicopters came back,
18:21and this time,
18:22the exhausted Sherpas began pulling the lifeless bodies of their friends and brothers
18:27they had eaten breakfast with just a few hours earlier
18:29over to the hovering helicopter line
18:32to be flown off the mountain.
18:34This went on,
18:36on and off,
18:36for almost two full days,
18:38until it just became too dangerous to keep going.
18:41The ice was still moving,
18:43the giant walls around them were cracking,
18:45and everyone knew that if they stayed up there much longer,
18:49they could end up needing to be rescued themselves.
18:51So, eventually,
18:53they had to stop.
18:54Out of the sixteen men who had gone missing,
18:56they had managed to bring thirteen back down.
18:59The other three were still up there,
19:02buried so deep under the ice
19:03that there was simply no safe way to reach them.
19:07And then came one of the most painful details of the whole thing.
19:10Eleven of the sixteen men who died
19:12were found within just a few feet of each other.
19:15They had been standing together on that same crowded ledge,
19:19and somehow,
19:20seconds before the ice came down,
19:22they must have realized what was happening.
19:25They tried to get away,
19:26but couldn't,
19:27so they huddled together,
19:28as if somehow being together
19:30could make the ice hurt a little less.
19:33I believe they tried to escape,
19:35Locke Parita said later,
19:37and when they realized they couldn't,
19:39they huddled together.
19:41A single falling block of ice
19:43had wiped out sixteen men.
19:45For the Sherpas,
19:46it was,
19:47and still is,
19:48one of the worst days in the history of Mount Everest.
19:52What made all of this even harder to swallow
19:54for the Sherpas
19:55was that this disaster felt almost
19:57just spiritual.
19:59Everest,
20:00to them,
20:01is not just a mountain,
20:02but a deity called Chomoluma,
20:05the goddess mother of the world,
20:07and for years,
20:08they'd watched their own people die on its slopes,
20:10carrying tents,
20:11oxygen,
20:12and supplies,
20:13so someone else could stand on the summit
20:15and take a photo.
20:16This horrific accident felt like a violent,
20:20unavoidable warning from a mountain
20:22that had finally had enough of their greed.
20:25But for the Nepali government,
20:27it meant nothing.
20:28Look,
20:29disasters happen.
20:30No one can quite control that,
20:32but when foreigners get into serious trouble on Everest,
20:36Nepal has shown that it can move mountains to get them out.
20:39We know this because we've seen it happen.
20:42For example,
20:43back in 1996,
20:44two expedition teams were caught exposed
20:46right in the middle of one of the worst storms Everest had ever seen,
20:49and when the storm was over,
20:51two people were barely alive.
20:53Rescuers finally got them down to around 19,000 feet,
20:57but they still needed help immediately.
20:59The only way they were going to survive
21:01was to get them out by helicopter,
21:03something that was considered almost impossible
21:05for civilian pilots at the time.
21:07So,
21:08the Nepali government told a Nepalese army pilot named Madan KC
21:11to fly his chopper right over the edge of its mechanical limits up those heights.
21:16This man risked his own life
21:18and a multi-million dollar military asset
21:20just to bring those two foreigners home.
21:23He got them out.
21:24So,
21:24it wasn't a question of whether the Nepali government could step up
21:28when disaster struck Everest.
21:29They had already shown that they could.
21:31The question was
21:32who they were willing to step up for.
21:35Now,
21:3618 years later,
21:37when 16 of their own countrymen fell in the Khumbu Icefall,
21:41the government quite simply could not find the money
21:44or the urgency to do the same for their own.
21:47Their only answer was 40,000 rupees,
21:50or about $400,
21:51as compensation to the widows of the men
21:54who lost their lives.
21:56$400 for a human life,
21:58for doing a job on a mountain
21:59where a single climbing permit costs about $10,000.
22:04And roughly 400 foreign clients
22:06were sitting in their tents at base camp that 2014 morning.
22:10That amount of money wasn't going to replace a husband or a father.
22:14It certainly wasn't going to put a kid through school
22:16or replace the only paycheck an entire family relied on to survive the year.
22:21In fact,
22:22it wasn't even enough to cover the cost of a funeral.
22:25What's the use of a payout that can't take care of the dead
22:28or those they left behind?
22:30They'd pulled their friends' bodies out of the ice
22:32just three days earlier.
22:34Now they had one more decision to make.
22:36Go back to work
22:37or make the government listen.
22:39So on April 21st, 2014,
22:42a group of Sherpas,
22:44expedition leaders,
22:45and rescue workers
22:46sat down together at base camp
22:48and handed a paper with 13 demands
22:51straight to the government.
22:52Throw the $400 payout in the trash.
22:55Double the life insurance.
22:57Hand over 30% of the permit fees
23:00to a relief fund
23:01for the widows burying husbands that week.
23:03And for Dorje Sherpa's four kids
23:05who just lost the father
23:07who was saving up to move them near a school.
23:10Meet it by April 28th
23:11or Everest doesn't open this season.
23:14And the government responded,
23:16well, sort of.
23:18Mount Everest was Nepal's golden goose after all.
23:21If the season got cancelled,
23:23the government was going to have to deal
23:24with hundreds of furious,
23:26wealthy foreigners
23:27demanding their $10,000 permit fees back.
23:31Kathmandu knew they had to do something fast.
23:33But instead of doing what was right by the Sherpas,
23:36they just haggled
23:38like they were bargaining
23:39over the price of climbing gear
23:41instead of the blood of 16 men.
23:43They killed the 30% relief fund plan
23:46and replaced it with just 5% instead.
23:49And the demand to double
23:50the workers' mandatory life insurance
23:52was just flat-out refused.
23:55Think about what that math
23:57actually means on the ground.
23:59To a politician
24:00sitting in a warm office in Kathmandu,
24:02saving that extra money
24:04was a budget victory.
24:05But to a widow
24:07sitting in a cold,
24:08stone house
24:09in the Khumbu Valley,
24:10that missing money
24:11was the difference
24:12between surviving the year
24:14or freezing.
24:15It was an absolute slap in the face.
24:18It proved to the Sherpas
24:20that even in death,
24:21their lives were just
24:22a negotiable line item
24:24on a spreadsheet.
24:25Now, the government
24:27did agree to things
24:28like building memorials
24:29and paying for the education
24:31of the kids
24:31who had just lost their dads.
24:33A stone plaque
24:34in the capital city
24:35is a nice gesture,
24:37but a monument
24:38doesn't buy firewood.
24:39It doesn't pay
24:40the medical bills
24:41for a 20-year-old kid
24:42who survives an avalanche
24:44but can never climb again.
24:46The government
24:47was perfectly happy
24:48to honor dead Sherpas,
24:49but the core systemic changes
24:51that would protect
24:52these workers
24:53from ending up destitute
24:55if they lost a leg
24:56in the icefall
24:57were just ignored.
24:58They did step up
25:00to protect someone else,
25:01though.
25:02While they were haggling
25:03over pennies
25:04with the widows,
25:04the government
25:05quietly announced
25:06that the Western clients
25:07who had their season
25:08canceled
25:09would get to keep
25:10their $10,000 permits
25:12for the next five years.
25:14They bent over backward
25:15to protect
25:15their tourists' investments
25:17while leaving
25:18their own people
25:19out in the cold.
25:20The government thought
25:22that throwing Sherpas
25:23a bone was enough,
25:24that this slightly
25:26better offer
25:26would be just enough
25:28to put a band-aid
25:29over the problem
25:29and get the oxygen bottles
25:31moving back up the mountain,
25:32because, historically,
25:35that is what
25:36had always happened.
25:37And looking at
25:38that counteroffer,
25:39well, changes had been made,
25:41which is good,
25:42but was it enough?
25:44The government
25:44certainly thought so,
25:45but this time
25:46they completely
25:47misread the room,
25:48because when that
25:49counteroffer reached
25:50the base camp,
25:51it was like throwing
25:52a bucket of gasoline
25:53onto a fire.
25:54To the younger Sherpas,
25:56the ones actually
25:56organizing the strike,
25:58this haggling
25:59proved the government
26:00didn't actually value
26:02their lives
26:02as much as their
26:03own profit margin.
26:04Base camp quickly
26:05turned into a powder cake.
26:07Groups of angry,
26:09shouting young men
26:10started moving
26:11through the camp,
26:11going tent to tent.
26:12They were pumping
26:14their fists,
26:15chanting,
26:16and explicitly
26:17making it clear
26:18to any Sherpa
26:19who dared to put
26:19his boots on
26:20and go back to work
26:21that climbing
26:22was cancelled
26:23this season.
26:24Tents were threatened,
26:26rocks were thrown.
26:27It became physically
26:29dangerous for any
26:30local worker
26:31to even think
26:32about breaking
26:33the strike.
26:34At the exact same
26:35time,
26:35you had the
26:36Western clients,
26:37some of whom,
26:38to be fair,
26:39were deeply sympathetic
26:40to their cause.
26:41Others were just
26:42furious.
26:43Some of them
26:44had paid up to
26:45$75,000,
26:47quit their corporate
26:48jobs,
26:49and trained for up
26:50to three years
26:51just for this
26:52one two-month window.
26:53All that time,
26:55all that money,
26:56all that preparation,
26:58only to be told
26:58they couldn't climb.
27:00It was a total mess.
27:02The panic got so intense
27:04that on April 24th,
27:05when the Nepalese
27:06government realized
27:07they were about to
27:08lose their
27:08multi-million dollar
27:09season,
27:10they actually flew
27:11a delegation of
27:12high-ranking politicians
27:13in a helicopter
27:14straight from the
27:15capital to base camp.
27:17The Minister of Tourism
27:18stepped out into
27:19the freezing,
27:20thin air at
27:2117,000 feet,
27:22stood in front of
27:24this massive crowd
27:25of grieving,
27:26furious men,
27:27and tried to give
27:28a political speech
27:29to calm everyone down.
27:31But the younger
27:32Sherpas just
27:33shouted him down.
27:35Right then,
27:36the expedition bosses
27:37realized the government
27:38had completely
27:39lost control
27:40of the mountain.
27:41If they tried to
27:42force their teams
27:43to climb,
27:44there was going
27:45to be a riot.
27:46So,
27:46one by one,
27:48the massive
27:48Western guiding
27:49companies surrendered,
27:51quietly packed
27:52their gear,
27:53slung their heavy
27:54packs over their
27:54shoulders,
27:55and began the
27:56long walk
27:57down the valley.
27:58For the first time
27:59since the commercial
28:00climbing industry
28:01took over Everest,
28:02a season was
28:03shut down
28:04due to mass action.
28:06The 2014 Everest
28:07climbing season
28:08was officially over.
28:09By holding their
28:10ground and refusing
28:11to climb,
28:12they forced the
28:13government to scrap
28:14that insulting
28:15$400 payout,
28:16eventually securing
28:17about $5,000
28:18for each of the
28:19grieving widows
28:20instead.
28:21The Sherpas
28:22proved their worth,
28:23they won.
28:24But,
28:25there was one thing
28:26no strike could change.
28:28They still needed
28:29Everest to survive,
28:31and exactly one year
28:32and one week later,
28:33they were back
28:34on the mountain
28:35when a 7.8 magnitude
28:36earthquake struck Nepal.
28:38This time,
28:39the danger didn't come
28:40from the Khumbu icefall.
28:42The earthquake shook loose
28:44a massive avalanche
28:45from Pumori
28:46that tore straight
28:48through base camp.
28:49Nineteen people
28:50lost their lives
28:51to this avalanche.
28:52Just 372 days
28:54after the deadliest day
28:55in Everest's history,
28:57the mountain had broken
28:58its own record.
28:59Despite that,
29:01when Everest opened again
29:02for climbing
29:03the following season,
29:04the Sherpas returned.
29:06Because,
29:07earthquakes are terrifying,
29:08but so is watching
29:09your family starve.
29:11Hunger always
29:12outlasts fear.
29:13So,
29:14when the next spring
29:15rolled around
29:15and wealthy tourists
29:16came back
29:17with their checkbooks,
29:19Sherpas quietly
29:19put their boots on
29:20and walked right back up
29:22into the ice.
29:23They are trapped
29:24in a machine
29:25that views them
29:26as expendable.
29:27But,
29:28who is really
29:29keeping that machine running?
29:30The government
29:31making millions
29:32every year
29:33from Everest?
29:34Or,
29:34the expedition companies
29:35making fortunes
29:36selling the summit
29:37while Sherpas
29:38take most of the risk?
29:40And,
29:41which one is really
29:42any better?
29:43I don't know.
29:44But,
29:44if you think
29:45the massive,
29:46headline-grabbing
29:47disasters of 2014
29:48and 2015
29:49are the darkest things
29:51that have happened
29:52to Sherpas
29:52on this mountain,
29:53you're wrong.
29:54Because,
29:55this next video
29:56is all about
29:56the top six
29:57worst Sherpa deaths
29:58in Everest's history.
30:00From a mother
30:01stranded in the freezing dark
30:02forced to make
30:04a devastating choice
30:05to a $50,000
30:06corporate stunt
30:07that turned into
30:09a deadly game
30:09of every man
30:10for himself.
30:11The worst Sherpa deaths
30:13in Everest's history
30:14are genuinely upsetting.
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