Into Thin Air

Title: Into Thin Air

Author: John Krakauer
Published: 1999
Read: July 2010
Number of pages: 333
Non-Fiction
Where I obtained the book: Amazon.com

How I discovered it: already was aware of the story and wanted to read the book
My grade: A

I have always been fascinated about events from the '90s. I think it's because it was the first decade I actually remember certain things that happened. True I was around in the '80s and while I'm familiar with events like the Berlin Wall being torn down, the Challenger explosion, and uh, whatever else happened in the '80s, I don't remember when they actually happened because I was much too young.

"Into Thin Air" is about the incredible and tragic true story of an expedition to the summit of Mount Everest on May 10, 1996 when a handful of people were killed due to the harsh conditions. While I don't have a vivid "where I was when this happened" memory, I  vaguely remember hearing about this when it was on the news, (or more likely, it was probably Dateline NBC or one of those news shows who did a piece on it), but it wasn't until a couple years ago when I was reminded of the story when I found the made for TV movie  and found out about this book and thought it would make for a good read, but I couldn't seem to find it at any bookstore or at the two libraries that are near me, so I finally decided to order it from Amazon. It was definitely worth the wait. The book is pretty amazing, although it makes me never want to summit Mount Everest (not that I ever wanted to in the first place!)

Krakauer, a journalist who's also a climber, was sent to Nepal by Outside magazine to write an article about the commercialization of the highest peak in the world. Initially, he was just going to stay at the base camp, but wanting to summit the mountain, he asked them if they could wait a year so he could train and if they could finance the $65,000 it costs for an expedition to Everest. $65,000! I guess even death has a price tag! And this was fifteen years ago! I wonder how much it costs nowadays? 

The climbers who died that day ranged in age from 31 - 57 and included both guides and clients. They had to deal with altitude sickness - Everest is a little over 29,000 feet, apparently that's about the same cruising altitude of an airliner, so just think about that for a second! - even though they had oxygen, they had to make sure to preserve it and the high altitude made them delirious. There were also temperatures that got as low as 100 below and if any body part became exposed it would immediately become frostbitten. The climbers who first reached the summit started at around three in the morning and didn't get to the peak until a little after one in the afternoon - and that's just the halfway point because they had to then descend the mountain. That's when most of the people died. There was a huge storm and many of them were tired, freezing, and lacking oxygen.

It makes you wonder what would ever allure people to do something like that. It just seems like such a waste of life and it made me angry at some of the people in the book for the stupid decisions they made. For instance, one of the guides, saw that one of the clients was very tired and instead of insisting that they turn back, he urged him on to the top. Now this client has been on Everest before with the same guide, but he hadn't reached the top due to fatigue. I suppose the guide wanted to make sure he got to the top this time, which he did, but in the end it cost both of them their lives.

Very fascinating read. HIghly recommended. Climbing Everest? Not so much!