K2: The Savage Mountain | The Final Descent | 3
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It's pitch dark and Koss von der Havel is exhausted. But his mind is surprisingly clear. Not exactly sharp, but at least his reflexes are decent. After climbing for 24 hours though, his body aches in ways he's never felt before. He knows he has to keep moving. Out here on the mountain and at this altitude, if you stop to rest, there's a good chance you won't wake up.

This is Cas' first climb above 26,000 feet. He was thrilled when his friend Wilco van Ruygen invited him to be part of the Dutch NORC team. The two used to fix up houses together, and he's joined him on several climbing trips. While he knew the risks of climbing K2, he knows Wilco was a strong leader. He had planned the trip down to every last detail, but Cas lost him somewhere on the snowfield, along with his other teammates. Now, he's alone.

Cass focuses on the ledge under his feet. At least he's found the fixed line laid by the trail breakers. The rope should guide him back across the traverse, down the bottleneck, and back to Camp 4. He just needs to stay alert and to focus. Cass has only his ice axe and the crampons to help him along the icy ledge. It's slow going. The only sounds are his breathing and the ancient groans of the mountain shifting its weight.

When he looks up, he's startled to see someone's headlamp in the distance. Someone wearing a dark yellow suit. When he gets closer, Cass sees it belongs to a familiar face. It's Hugh Dobreit, a French climber. He and Hugh took pictures together on the summit just a few hours ago. At 61 years old, Hugh is the second oldest person to ever summit K2. At the peak, he was overflowing with joy, laughing and hugging other climbers.

But now, he's stopped, his face pressed against the ice wall. Breathing heavily, he ran out of oxygen hours ago. "Hugh, are you okay?" "Still here, but you go first, and I'll follow. You're faster than me." "Okay, but don't stay too long." Cass unclips his harness and steps around the French climber, then continues down, feeling his way through the dark mountain night. But then, the rope comes to an end.

Cass aims his headlight below. Piles of snow and ice debris litter the bottleneck. There must have been an avalanche. Luckily, someone has screwed in a new anchor close by, and also tied on a rope. Cass clips on and begins to rappel down backwards. The rope takes him to the top of the bottleneck, but then it ends too. He'll need to make his way down the steep, dangerous slope on his own, with nothing to guide him.

He glances up to see if Hugh is following behind, but no sign of him yet. Cass digs his axe into the ice and starts to make his way down, step by careful step. When he hears the sound, at first, he's not sure what it is. He looks to the left, trying to pierce through the darkness of the night. That's when he sees a body clenching headfirst through the bottleneck. He recognizes the suit. It's Hugh.

Cass takes a few frantic steps, aiming his headlamp into the darkness. But Hugh's body is already gone, swallowed up by the mountain. He tries to double his pace. When he gets to the bottom, he'll radio down and tell them what he saw. Maybe, just maybe, someone can help. Now, he needs to focus on getting down safely himself.

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Listen along. New members can try Audible free for 30 days. Visit audible.com slash the odds or text the odds to 500-500. That's audible.com slash the odds or text the odds to 500-500. From Wondery, I'm Mike Corey, and this is Against the Odds. On August 1st, 2008, a group of climbers from all over the world attempted to summit the world's most dangerous mountain, K2.

Within 24 hours, three of those climbers were dead. Three others are entangled in ropes, hanging onto life by just a thread. The rest are making their way down the mountain in complete darkness. The hours spent in the oxygen-draining death zone have sapped their energy. The altitude is playing tricks on their minds.

And the ropes the climbers need for the most crucial part of the descent, called the bottleneck, have been swept away by avalanches. Now, it's a race against the clock for the remaining climbers to get off the mountain before it's too late. This is Episode 3, The Final Descent.

Pemba Sherpa reaches Camp 4 at 1:30 AM along with two other Sherpas, Cheering Diorje from the American team and Pasang Lama from the Korean team. They are greeted by two members from the American team, Dr. Eric Meyer and his teammate, Frederick Strang. They hand the climbers hot tea to help them warm up, but Pemba can't keep the tea down. He walks outside and throws up what little there is in his stomach.

When he comes back, Eric gives him some medicine, then the group sits down to speak. Pemba tells them about the difficult journey down from the traverse. The rope line was severed. An avalanche. Cheering tells them how they couldn't get the other climbers to move. They had used all their strength to get to the summit, and they were disoriented and losing muscle coordination.

We tried to guide them to the traverse, but they kept falling asleep and unclipping from the rope. It was a disaster. There was nothing we could do. Eric nods. Every climber knows the risks of summiting a mountain like K2. Each person needs to make his or her own decisions. No one can force anyone to do anything.

Pemba tells them about the conditions. He's never seen anything like it in his 20 years of climbing. All the rope line in the bottleneck was gone, torn to pieces and buried under piles of snow. They had to navigate down in the dark while listening to the cracking sounds from the serac above that threatened to crash down on their heads. An avalanche almost took Passang out, but cheering Diorje saved him.

When they reached the bottom, they tried to radio up to warn the others, but there was no answer. It was with heavy hearts they walked the last hours back to Camp 4. The Americans also have bad news. Three climbers have died, including Rolf Bay from the Norwegian team, swept away by the avalanche. Pemba asks if they've heard anything from his Dutch-Norwegian teammates, Wilco, Cass, and Gjerr.

No one has. Pemba knows they're all strong climbers. They came more prepared than almost anyone on the mountain. But no one is prepared for a night in the Death Zone, where temperatures can drop to 20 below. He makes his way to the tent he shares with Jer McDonald. But when he sees Jer's empty sleeping bag and all of his things, he's overcome with sadness.

Jur is a close friend. They climbed Mount Everest together and often talked long into the night about life and their families. Now, his Irish friend is alone on the dark mountain and in danger. He can't bear the thought of sleeping in the tent alone, so he moves to the tent of Italian climber Marco Confrontola, who is also still lost on the mountain.

Pemba drinks more water to hydrate and tucks into a sleeping bag. He'll need to rest and replenish his energy. If his team isn't back by morning, he may need to go up and rescue them. Cas van der Havel isn't sure what time it is when he finally reaches the bottom of the bottleneck.

All he knows is, he's lucky. He pulls out his radio and spins through the frequencies trying to get someone on the line. He finally reaches Roland, one of his Dutch Nord teammates at base camp. Ro? Ro. I'm still on the mountain, but I'm through the bottleneck. I'm okay, but the French climber Hugues, I think he fell. I saw a body go by. I looked for him on the way down, but I couldn't find him. What about Wilco? And Jur? And Pemba?

Are they with you? No, no. We were separated. I don't know where they are. I'm going to make my way to Camp 4. I can't feel my feet. As Cass begins the final trek across the snowfield, he sees headlamps approaching. It's two Sherpas from the Korean team. They're looking for their cousin Jumik and the other Korean climbers. Cass asks if anyone has made it back down.

They nod. Pemba Sherpa. He was with Turing and Pasang. We pass them on the way. Cass asks them to keep their eye out for Hugues, but in his heart, he knows the clamor is gone. And then, he heads for Camp 4. Goh Mi-sun battles her way down the mountain, pulling freezing mountain air into her lungs. Her oxygen cylinder expired hours ago. Every once in a while, she can see the twinkle of a headlamp far, far ahead.

It belongs to Mr. Kim, the Korean leader. They left Joomik and the others to try to find another way down. Now she's lost. At the top of the traverse, she finds the severed rope. But where is the line? Focus, focus. Then she finds the second rope hooked into an anchor. Down below, she can see Mr. Kim making his way down the bottleneck.

She climbs down and begins to pick her way along using her ice axes until she reaches the long, angled snow field at the bottom. When she looks up, she can no longer see Mr. Kim's headlamp at all. Mr. Kim! Her voice echoes across the dark slopes. No response. She's alone on the pitch-dark mountain. And now, the wind is picking up.

She's climbed 11 of the world's tallest peaks. She's gotten through difficult situations before. She can do this, but as she tries to feel her way along the ice, her mind starts to muddle. Her sense of direction is completely lost. Suddenly, she runs into an outcropping of jagged rocks. They are covered in ice and snow. This wasn't here on the way up. Did she get turned around?

Balancing carefully, she steps from one rock to the next. But then she gets stuck. She can't move up or down, and she can't see a thing. For all she knows, she's about to walk off a cliff. She sits down on a boulder and puts her head in her hands. It's so cold, she can feel her body shutting down. She bangs her gloved hands together to keep the circulation going. Her eyes start to close. She's so tired.

Suddenly, she's sitting at a wood table. Her 83-year-old father sits across from her. "Gomi-san," he says, "everyone is so proud of you. South Korea is so proud." His face is round and warm like the sun, inviting, calling to her, "Fly to me." Her eyes snap awake. She can't fall asleep.

She needs something to do. She takes off her headlamp and checks the batteries. Maybe the arc of light will guide someone towards her. But with each passing minute, she feels herself growing colder and colder. She knows soon, hypothermia will set in. And then, she sees lights moving up the mountain. Mr. Kim? Dee Dee!

It's the Sherpas, Tsering and Big Pasang. Didi is their pet name for her. It means big sister in Nepali. They are Jumik's cousins, her favorite Sherpa. As they draw closer, she cries out, Mr. Kim, where is Mr. Kim? Don't worry, Didi. He's back at Camp 4. He told us to come look for you. And Jumik, where is Jumik? It's quiet for a moment. Then Big Pasang speaks up.

He's still on the mountain. Her heart sinks. She was the one who urged Jumik to join the expedition. This is her fault. Maybe she should go back up and look for him, but she can't think. Jumik will be okay. He's strong. We need to get you back to Camp 4. Big Pasang pulls her free from the rock and clips her safety harness to their own with a rope. At 4.30am, they deliver Gomi's son to Mr. Kim's tent.

There are tears in his eyes. Thank you, Tsering. Thank you, Big Pesang. The two men nod respectfully and head back to the mountain. They must find Jumek. Jer McDonald opens his eyes. It's 5 a.m. He survived the night on the mountain in sub-zero temperatures without a sleeping bag. Above him, the dawn is bathing K2's craggy flanks in peach-colored light.

Jur can hardly see it. His eyelids are encrusted with ice. But as the first rays of the sun begin to warm him, he slowly comes to life. "Marco, are you up?" Marco Confortola quickly jumps to his feet. "We're alive, Jur. Let's get Wilco and find a way down." A hundred meters away, Wilco is already awake, stamping his feet, trying to restore circulation and warm up his limbs. "The ropes have to be close by.

I think we should split up. If one of us finds them, we can call out to the others." Wilco walks off in one direction, and Marco and Jur head the opposite way. But as Wilco walks, he's just as confused as he was the night before. Everything looks the same, and there is no sign of the ropes. He has a pounding headache. "Why is this so hard?" Then his eyes start to blur, and he realizes what's happening to him.

His eyes are literally being burned by the sun's ultra-violent light. The headache is part of that, but it's also likely fluid building up in his brain from lack of oxygen. A condition called cerebral edema. If there's any chance of surviving, he needs to get down now. Rope or no rope. He quickly makes his way back to Marco and Jer.

Listen guys, if I go snow blind, I won't be able to look for anything and you guys can't carry me in your condition. I just need to go down. And then, without a goodbye, Wilco walks away.

Jer watches Wilco get further and further away and says a prayer that his team leader will be alright. Then he turns to Marco. "Let's find this damn rope already, okay?" They slowly trace their steps back to the ridge under the looming Serac and make their way across. And then they find it. The first anchor. Tied around it. The rope. "Marco, this is it."

He and Marco quickly clip in and begin to make their way across the snow. Jura in the lead. He's so focused on the task that when he stumbles upon the scene, he's not quite sure what he's seeing. On the snow in front of them is a climber hanging from a rope. His harness is wrapped around his feet. A camera dangles from his neck. His face is bruised and his eyes are closed.

Another climber hangs upside down just below him, groaning in pain, attached to the same rope. A third is tangled up slightly above them like a spider caught in the mountain's web. He's blue-gray in color from frostbite, and he's missing a boot, but he's still alive. Jur recognizes them immediately. It's the Sherpa, Jumikbote, and two climbers from the Korean team. But how did they get here?

Maybe an avalanche swept them over the side. Jumeuk calls out weakly, "Please, do you see my boot?" Jer quickly unclips from his harness and makes his way down to the Korean climber caught upside down. He gently lifts up his head to help him breathe. Jer has always been deeply inspired by Sherpa codes of loyalty and respect for human life. They will need more people to help free the men from the ropes, but at least they can make them more comfortable.

He tells Marco to give him a hand to try and loosen the rope. He's afraid to cut it entirely, it could send all of them hurtling down the mountain. But Marco finds an ice axe and a knife and quickly cuts off a length of rope. Then he jams the axe into a crack in the ice and secures one end to the handle. He ties the other end around the climber's waist and the two open the man's harness.

As Marco cradles the man's head, Jur takes the weight of the dangling body and begins to lower it down. As they tend to the climbers, Jur leans down and whispers into each man's ear, You're gonna be okay. Help is here.

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It's 7 a.m., and Wilko von Ruyen feels like he's dying from thirst. His throat is parched and his tongue dry. He wants to put a fistful of snow into his mouth to ease the pain, but he can't. It would drop heat from his core, which he desperately needs.

He's completely lost. Again. He had climbed down as far as he could go and hit a steep overhang. So, he had to go back up. Now, he has no idea where he is. His eyes feel like they are on fire. And every few steps, he falls asleep, leaning on his ice axe. He talks to himself to try and stay awake. "Okay Wilco, watch your step. Keep steady now. Just three steps forward. Three steps. You can do three steps. Watch your balance.

And then, miraculously, he finds the rope. He has no idea how it got here, but he's filled with gratitude. He quickly clips on and makes his way forward, only to find the same thing other climbers before him discovered: the severed rope. His vision is so blurry, he doesn't see the second rope. Instead, like Pemba Sherpa before him, he begins to climb down past the first rope, alpine style, with only his ice axe and crampons.

But the sun is beating down on his head and he is so very tired. Finally, he simply stops, like a wind-up toy on its last click. This is it, he thinks. This is where it all ends. Marco Confortola's energy is flagging, but he knows he needs to help Jur with the Korean climbers who are tangled up in the rope. Still, there's only so much they can do.

They've been here for nearly two hours and they're both exhausted, but Jur refuses to give up. As Marco works on untangling a knot, he looks up. Jur has finished laying the top climber carefully onto the snow. The Korean climbers are in no shape to move, but at least they're a bit more comfortable. Suddenly, Jur starts up the mountain. Marco's confused. What is he doing? "Jur, where are you going? Come back!"

But Jer keeps climbing. Marco calls out again, but Jer doesn't turn around. Moments later, he disappears under the serac. Marco is stunned. Has the night spent freezing on the mountain driven Jer insane? Should he chase after his friend? Or should he go back down? He's so incredibly tired. If he goes up, he might not make it back. He has to save himself. As he turns away, he sees a microphone peeking out of Jumik's coat.

but there's no radio attached. It must have become dislodged in the fall. After a few minutes of searching, he finds it in the snow and radios back to camp four. "Hello? Hello? Do you hear me? I'm here, near the Serac, and there are people here. They need help. I'm tired. Please send somebody up." He listens for a response, a voice on the other end to tell him it'll be okay. Help is coming, but there's nothing. Marco is on his own.

Frederick Strang peers up the mountain. The day is clear, but it looks like clouds are starting to roll in at certain altitudes. Strang has been monitoring conditions from Camp 4, watching for climbers since dawn, along with his teammate Dr. Eric Meyer. Now it's mid-morning. Occasionally, they catch a glimpse of tiny figures high up on the mountain, near the traverse, but no one's come in since Gomi's son was brought in by the Sherpas.

Then, Strang sees something odd. "Erik, come out here. Do you see that?" Erik pops out of his tent. "There, right there. Above the Serac." It's a lone figure, climbing in the opposite direction, towards Tibet. The altitude must have got to his brain. Can you see who it is? But the climber is too far away, and growing more distant.

Strang calls the other climbers together, including Pemba Sherpa, who knows the mountain better than anyone now. Should they attempt a rescue? But everyone agrees it's not safe. Not with the unpredictable avalanches and the rope line destroyed. There are too few people without enough equipment. They hardly have enough food or water at Camp 4 for themselves. Attempting a rescue now would be a suicide mission. So for now, they'll have to stay.

Marco Confortola is somewhere on the bottleneck. At least that's where he thinks he is. But the rope is gone. As he clambers down, his legs feel heavy like blocks of wood. He's not sure how many more steps he can take. And then, he hears a familiar rumble somewhere on the top. An avalanche. When he hears the first rock and icefall coming his way, he tries to tuck himself against the wall and make himself small.

His heart is pounding and he starts to pray. And then it's here, a thundering cascade of ice and snow. But before it envelops him completely, it suddenly stops. Marco looks up to see a few large chunks of ice and debris tumble past him, along with a pair of yellow boots. He knows those boots. They belong to Drew McDonald.

The last time he saw them, they were on Jur's feet as he walked up the mountain. Marco sinks to his knees. He can't do this anymore. This is too much. But he can't die here on the mountain. He stumbles up again and he takes a few steps. Then he falls. He's too weak. He can't even pick up his legs. So he begins to crawl forward on his hands and knees, inch by inch.

Then, emerging out of the clouds, he sees two figures. He must be hallucinating. But as the figures get closer, he recognizes their suits. It's two of the Sherpas from the Korean team, Jumeok's cousins. For the first time in more than 24 hours, relief washes over him. And then, he passes out.

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Head over to Symbiotica.com and use code ODDS for 20% off and free shipping on your subscription order. Pemba sits in his tent at Camp 4, flipping through the walkie-talkie dials, trying to reach someone, anyone on the mountain. Some of the others have packed up and headed down to base camp, but Pemba and Cass have decided to stay. They still have two teammates on the mountain. Others are up there too, at least eight climbers by his account.

Pemba's seen miracles happen before. Maybe they'll find them. On an expedition to Chou-U-Yu, the sixth highest peak in the world, he saw climbers survive for more than four days without oxygen, sleeping bags, or food. It can happen here too. His teammates are strong. At midday, he hears the familiar crackle of the radio. It's Jumik's cousin, Big Pasang Bote. Pemba?

We found someone. He crawled towards us and then he collapsed. But he's alive. What color is his suit? It's black and green. Pemba knows who it is. It's Marco Confortola. Pemba, he's in pretty bad shape. We need to keep going to find Jumic. We're just below the bottleneck. Can you come? Pemba feels a jolt of energy. Someone is alive. He needs to help them.

He quickly searches the remaining tents for extra oxygen. Marco will need it. Then he talks to the remaining climbers at Camp 4 to see if anyone else wants to go. But no one volunteers. They are all exhausted. Conditions are too dangerous. The only one who offers to assist is his teammate Cass. But as soon as the two set out, it's clear Cass won't even make it across the vast snowfield. His descent early this morning depleted every last ounce of energy.

Pemba tells him to stay. He'll carry on. Wilco is furious. He spent months studying K2 and knew the descent would be the hardest and most difficult part. Why did he leave his GPS device and strobe light behind? He has finally found a slightly flatter part on the route, but now the clouds have rolled in. Grit fills his eyes, his mouth is badly parched, and his anger turns to fear.

He turns around in circles, but can't see through the fog. He thought he was going down. Maybe he's turned in the opposite direction. He needs to do something. He pulls out his satellite phone, but he can't see the numbers he had programmed in. The only number he remembers is home. It's his wife, Helene. Wilco, where are you? I don't know, Helene. Somewhere on the mountain. You need to call Martin and tell him to call Basecamp. Tell them I think I'm below the bottleneck somewhere.

He tries to keep his voice calm. Wilco, are you with the others? No, no, we got separated. I'm alone. I'll call Martin. And Wilco, please hold on. Wilco hangs up the phone and begins to blindly walk forward, hoping it's down. It's early afternoon when Pemba finds Italian climber Marco Confortola. He knew Marco would be dazed and exhausted, but it's far worse than that. He's missing both his hat and his gloves, and his suit is unzipped.

His eyes are closed. When Pemba checks his pulse, Marco's eyes fly open. Who are you? It's me, Pemba Sherpa from the Dutch Nort team. I'm here to help. He gently places the oxygen mask over the climber's mouth, but Marco's not having it. He tries to fight him off. It's okay, Marco. Just breathe. It's going to be okay. Pemba hears the radio squawk. It's Big Passant. Pemba, we found Jumik. He's alive. We're bringing him down.

Pemba breathes a sigh of relief. "Have you seen anyone else?" "We saw one other, but he was hit by an icefall. He was in a black and red suit." "Jerry McDonald's suit is black and red." Pemba tries to push the thought from his mind. Right now, he needs to get Marco off the mountain. He's helping the climber into a sitting position when he hears the roar. Another avalanche.

Moments later, a wave of snow falls over them, followed by fragments of icy rock. It sounds like hundreds of metal balls forced through a chute with frigid gusts of wind. He looks up and sees a tangle of bodies and climbing equipment hurtling down the mountain. Ember crouches over Marco and grabs onto his suit to keep him from sliding down with him.

When it's over, Pemba approaches the tangle of human wreckage. There are two bodies wrapped in ropes. Their suits are ripped. Their faces are bruised. At first, Pemba doesn't recognize them. But when he kneels down, he sees that it's Big Pasang and his cousin Jumek. The two cousins lie head to toe, wrapped together in death's embrace.

Beyond them are two more bodies in the snow. They are wearing red down suits like the ones worn by the Korean team, but also Drew McDonald. Pemba takes a few photos to show the other climbers who are waiting anxiously for news of their teams. Then he heads back to Marco. "Marco, we need to go down. It's not safe." He pulls out a rope and attaches himself to Marco's harness and then leads him down the rest of the slope across the snow back to Camp 4.

When they arrive, Pemba tells the Korean team what happened to their teammates and Sherpa helpers. They are utterly crushed. But there's still one climber up there in the death zone. And while Pemba was gone, word came in from base camp that Wilco used his phone to call home. He's alive, but the sun will be setting soon. Pemba slips into Cass' tent. "How are you feeling?" "I'm okay. Let's go find Wilco." The death zone has Wilco von Ruyen by the throat.

It's 5:00 AM on Sunday, August 3rd. His feet are completely numb. He's nearly snow blind and every cell in his body is screaming for oxygen. But he made it through another night on the mountain at 25,000 feet in sub-zero temperatures. The night before, he got a second wind after speaking to his friend Martin by phone. Martin was trying to track his movements by plotting the GPS coordinates through the sat phone signals.

Martin told him to hang on. Think of Helene and your son, he said, and don't fall asleep. So he tried to continue. But when the sun set, it didn't make sense to go on. It was too dangerous. He had to dig in. That's when he saw the bodies. One in a yellow suit, another a few yards further up. He had no idea who they were, but it was too late to move anywhere else. He scraped out a snow hole with his gloves and settled in.

He slept an hour, maybe two. It was the longest night of his life. Now, here he sits, perched on a ledge, watching the sunrise. If every cell in his body wasn't screaming out in pain, he'd enjoy this moment. The quiet of the mountain. The sparkle of the snow. Not many people get to see raw beauty like this. But he needs to get up. That's what Helene told him to do. Keep moving.

Chris Klinke steps out of his tent at base camp. It's August 3rd, just after 5 a.m. Klinke has been awake most of the night scanning the mountain with his binoculars. He was certain he saw someone up there the night before. He was wearing a bright orange suit. He hopes the daylight will give him a better view.

Klinky is on the American team. He's blonde and burly with a broad, open face. When he isn't climbing mountains, he's an executive at American Express, so he knows about risk management. When he and the other members of the American team saw the line at the bottleneck two days ago, they decided to turn back. They reached base camp yesterday morning and quickly set up a line of telescopes and binoculars to monitor the mountain for survivors.

Clinky squints into the dawn and brings his binoculars to his eyes. There he is again. A small orange dot slowly picking its way across the southern face of the mountain. "Roland! Get up! Come out here! He's back!" Roland is from the Dutch Nort team. All four of his teammates are still missing. He rushes over to the telescope.

Yeah, that's Wilco's suit. But what is he doing? I can't tell. He looks like he's about 300 feet above Camp 3. Klinky hears another shout. Look, there's another climber above Camp 3. It's one of the Serbian climbers. It's Cass. They're so close to each other. Get Pemba on the radio. He's up in Camp 3. The climber frantically searches through the frequencies. Pemba, hello? Hello, are you there? Pemba?

Pemba jolts awake at the sound of a rock crashing onto his tent at Camp 3. He and Cass searched for Wilco most of the night, but then they got separated. Pemba thought they'd meet up at Camp 3, but Cass never showed up. He spent most of the night worrying in his tent, frantically calling down to base before passing out. Pemba switches on the radio. Pemba, are you there? Wilco is about 600 feet from Camp 3, and we saw Cass too. He's making his way to you.

Pemba steps out of his tent and looks around. Cass is picking his way across the rock. Cass, where were you? I got lost. I had to spend the night on the mountain. Pemba can see Cass is exhausted, but they both know this is their window. They make their way across the mountain, keeping their eyes peeled. Basecamp does their best to direct them. Go down. Down. To your left. Shout his name. Maybe he'll hear you. Wilco! Wilco! Wilco!

Yeah, that's it. I think he heard you. Keep yelling. Keep going. Wilco sees two flickering shimmers of color somewhere in the distance, but he can't be sure. Are they tents? People? Or is he hallucinating? Then he hears voices, but it's like listening through water. Then the figures get closer. One of them is dressed in blue, the other in orange. That triggers something familiar in his brain, but he can't place it.

He staggers towards them, but he's lost all feeling in his feet. Suddenly, he understands that they're climbers, and they're just 600 feet in front of him. His brain suddenly snaps into focus. "Oh shit, that's Cas!" Wilco stumbles forward, into Cas's open arms. They shout with joy into the air, and Cas starts to cry. "I didn't think we were ever going to meet again." Pemba calls back to base camp. "We've got him! He's here!"

Wilco is alive. Woo! He's alive! He's alive! Oh my god, I can't believe it! He's alive! We'll come up with oxygen. No, there's no time. We'll come down. Pemba and Cass help Wilco back to Camp 3, where Wilco sucks in oxygen from a tank, and Cass boils water for tea. When their bodies are hydrated, Pemba urges them on. They need to get down before nightfall. Okay guys, time to go.

As the three surviving members of the Dutch team near the bottom of the mountain, Pemba sees something miraculous. A dozen mountaineers climbing up from base camp to greet them, yelling and cheering. If he wasn't so exhausted, it would feel like a party. Erik Meijer quickly brings them into the Dutch mess tent, which he's converted into an emergency medical facility. Cooks boil water to bathe the men's feet and hands. Tjering Dorje and some of the other Sherpas join them in the tent.

As Pemba sips a hot drink, Cheering tells him he got word to Pemba's family that he's safe.

Erik gives Wilco and Cas a cocktail of drugs to arrest the effects of snow blindness, hypoxia, and frostbite. Then he injects them with morphine to relieve their pain. Both climbers look years older, like the mountain has stolen ten years of their life. Their skin is gray and hangs from their faces. Cas's hands are especially bad. The fingers on his left hand are gray and limp with purple streaks running through.

Wilco asks about the others. They tell him 11 climbers lost their lives on K2. It's one of the worst mountaineering disasters in history. No one says anything after that. Most of them have lost friends and teammates. Pemba gets up and walks to his tent. He needs to be alone with his thoughts for a while. The next morning, a military helicopter takes Wilco and Cass to a hospital in a nearby town for treatment.

A day later, a second chopper airlifts out Italian climber Marco Confortola. Marco was the last to reach base camp, shattered and broken, but still alive. When the sound of the rotors fade away, Pemba accompanies some of the other survivors to the Art Gilchi Memorial. Gilchi was a climber who died on K2 in 1953.

Since then, people have decorated the Cairn of Rocks with plaques and flags in memory of all the climbers who lost their lives on K2. Today, one of the Serbian climbers has made two aluminum plaques, one for his fallen teammate Dren Mandic and the other for Jer MacDonald. The loss of Pemba's friend Jer weighs on him heavily. It was the Irishmen who brought Pemba onto the team.

Pemba can still picture him jigging about on the summit, waving his Irish flag. When all the plaques are hung, the climbers watch quietly as the plates clink against one another in the wind, the ting-ting-ting echoing across the desolate landscape. Two weeks later, Gerv's family holds their own memorial in his home village in County Limerick, Ireland. They hang Tibetan prayer flags inside the tent, and more than 1,000 people come pay their respects.

Musicians play Celtic tunes and friends bring gifts including a bodhran drum like the one Gyr used to play. Gyr risked his own life to save others when he found the three climbers tangled up in rope. Though Gyr was last seen by Marco Confortola, he didn't simply wander off as Marco thought. He had gone up the mountain to secure an anchor and rope to take the weight off the bodies. It was Gyr's way to help others. He is a true hero of the mountains.

The recovery for Jur's two Dutch teammates isn't easy, especially for Wilco, who has all of his toes amputated due to third-degree frostbite. From his hospital bed, he tries to answer reporters' questions, even though he's exhausted and on painkillers. They want to know what went wrong. He tells them collaborating with other teams was the problem. He thinks the Dutch team should have tried to summit on their own.

He believes the sharing of rope was what caused the delay in the bottleneck, which led to climbers descending in the dark. A year later, he'll write a book about his near-death experience. He calls it "Surviving K2." Three years after the tragedy, he'll climb the highest peak in Antarctica. When he's not climbing, he lives in a renovated barn in Utrecht, the Netherlands, with his wife Helene and his two sons.

Italian climber Marco Confortola has a longer recovery before he climbs again. He'll have three inches of his foot removed along with most of his toes and will take him a year just to learn to walk again. But soon after, he returns to climbing. By 2018, he'll add several more stars to the ring of tattoos around his left bicep to commemorate all of the 28,000 foot peaks he has reached.

South Korean climber Go Mi Sun isn't so lucky. Her goal was to become the first woman to climb the 14 tallest mountains in the world. But less than a year after she reached the summit of K2, she runs into a wind and ice storm while descending from her 11th summit, Nangaparbhat, the ninth highest mountain in the world.

In whiteout conditions, she falls from a cliff to her death. Her body is recovered and brought back to Korea, where she is laid to rest, surrounded by her loved ones. Cecilia Skog, the other female climber who reached the summit on August 1st, returns home to Norway grief-stricken. She lost her husband on K2, and for months she's plagued by thoughts. Should she have gone back to the mountain to look for Rolf? Could she have done more?

she still has the harmonica Rolf took to K2. A year after the tragedy, she feels the call of the wild again and crosses Greenland on skis. In 2010, she makes the first unassisted crossing of Antarctica along with American explorer Ryan Walter. Later that year, she swaps her down jacket for a sequined studded halter top to appear on Dancing with the Stars. She tells reporters that she's dancing for Rolf.

Cecilia will go on to climb two more 8,000-meter peaks. But one thing she will never do is return to K2. It's October 2008, and Pemba Giljay Sherpa stands with his wife and two children before an altar at the big Mathraya Monastery, a holy site in Nepal. The smell of incense fills the air. Pemba presses his hands together, fingers pointing upward.

It's been hard for Pemba to come to terms with the tragedy on K2. Today, he has come to the monastery to pray. With the energy of aspiration for the Bodhisattva way, with a sense of deep respect, and with as many bodies as atoms of the world. To all you Buddhas, visualized as real, I bow down. Pemba and his heroic feats on K2 have been widely recognized.

Shortly after his return from K2, he was voted one of National Geographic's Adventurers of the Year. But the attention doesn't go to his head. True to his Sherpa ideals, in the coming years, Pemba will continue to help save climbers' lives in the Himalayas as a trainer in high-altitude mountaineering. He often reflects on the disaster on K2, but he refuses to blame the mountain. He tells a writer...

People call it killer mountain when they are not well prepared, do not have enough experience, not enough manpower. But it's not like that. K2 is a very beautiful mountain. This is the final episode of our three-part series, K2, The Savage Mountain. If you like our show, please give us a five-star rating and a review. On our next episode, we'll be talking to one of the climbers who was on K2 during the incredible events in early August.

And a quick note about our scenes. In most cases, we can't exactly know what was said, but everything is based on historical research. If you'd like to learn more about this event, we highly recommend the book, The Summit, How Triumph Turned to Tragedy on K2's Deadliest Days, by Pat Falvey and Pemba Giljay-Sherpa. And No Way Down, by Graham Boldy. We also recommend the documentary, The Summit, directed by Nick Ryan.

I'm your host, Mike Corey. Simon Worrell wrote this episode. Our editor is Maura Walls. Brian White is our associate producer. Our audio engineer is Sergio Enriquez. Vocal edit and sound design is by Joe Richardson. Original music by Francesco Quadrilopolo. Our executive producers are Stephanie Jentz and Marshall Louis for Wondery.

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