The highest mountain was first climbed 70 years ago: a Swiss almost became the first to climb Everest

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Those who think today of the first ascent of Mount Everest, think of the names Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay. 70 years ago, on May 29, 1953, the duo reached the highest point on Earth, the summit at 8,848 meters above sea level. It was a day for the history books and the day the New Zealander and Nepalese became immortal. But little would be missing, and today we wouldn’t still be raving about Hillary and Norgay, but Raymond Lambert and Norgay from Geneva.

review. On March 26, 1952, the Swiss Himalayan expedition reached the Nepalese capital of Kathmandu. Her ambitious goal: the first ascent of Mount Everest. The team of the mountain sports club L’Androsace in Geneva consists of leader Edouard Wyss-Dunant, René Dittert, Gabriel Chevalley, Léon Flory, René Aubert, André Roch, Jean-Jacques Asper, Ernst Hofstetter and of course Raymond Lambert. They are supported by Sherpa Tenzing Norgay. With them: tons of canned ravioli, condensed milk, cheese, dried beans, hazelnuts and… cigarettes.

Lambert was 37 at the time and had lost his toes after an incident on Mont Blanc. May 28, 1952 is the day when he wants to create something historic. Together with Norgay he arrived on the Everest ridge the day before at over 8,600 meters. The rest of the participants have already returned due to altitude sickness.

New world record height for Lambert

The drama takes its course. “A terrible night begins,” Lambert would later describe, “we have nothing to eat, so to speak, a little cheese, a sausage, a candle to melt some snow – that’s all. In this little tent on the ridge of Everest, a terrible fight against the cold begins. We tap each other all night and massage our limbs, which go numb.”

When the duo set out early in the morning after that restless night on May 28, 1952, the weather got worse and worse. “The snow hits us in the face. The oxygen we breathe from time to time only provides temporary relief. Without many words, Tenzing and I understand that we have to give up.”

The dream of the top burst forth. But that is only defeat at first sight. And for three reasons. First, if they hadn’t returned in time, they probably would have died. But as it was, everyone survived without major physical damage, even those who had given up beforehand. Second: Lambert and Norgay set a new world altitude record of about 8650 meters. And third, thanks to their preparatory work, Hillary and Norgay made the first ascent a year later.

They had to climb dry

For the Austrian-Swiss doctor and mountaineer Oswald Oelz, there are two main reasons why the Swiss expedition did not make it. The 80-year-old knows what he’s talking about. He wrote a book about that expedition and he himself stood on top of Mount Everest in 1978.

The wrong oxygen tactic. Oelz: “The fact that the Swiss did not reach the top was caused by a professor of physiology from Zurich. He advised the Swiss and believed that you can recharge your body with oxygen. He thought you could take a break, add oxygen, build a depot in your body, and then keep climbing. From today’s point of view, nonsense.”

The lack of fluids. Oelz: “At this altitude you should drink two to three liters, because deep and accelerated breathing causes a lot of water vapor and therefore liquid to escape into the air. But Lambert and Norgay only had a lousy stove with them and therefore drank far too little. They have climbed almost dry.”

Looking back, Lambert and Norgay are still winners for Oelz. “If they hadn’t returned in time, they might have died. Many mountaineers have fallen into similar situations from exhaustion, then dozed off and froze to death as a result.

Oswald Oelz, who was chief physician at Triemli City Hospital in Zurich from 1991 to 2006, experienced the dangers of mountaineering firsthand. “If you regularly go to this area and this altitude, about 50 percent of the people die. I also got lucky on a few occasions, most notably in 1984 on Dome Glacier, a sub-peak of Annapurna, when I got altitude sickness. It took me a few toes and some brain cells…”

What Raymond Lambert and his colleagues failed to do in 1952, Oelz did a quarter of a century later. When Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler became the first people to climb the roof of the world without the aid of oxygen bottles on May 8, 1978, Oelz was there.

When Oelz is asked about it today, 45 years later, he still gets emotional. “Normally I’m not that sentimental, but thinking about it brings tears to my eyes.”

After a few seconds of silence, he continued: «It was the pinnacle of my mountaineering life. When I reached the top it was magical and insane at the same time because I never thought I could do it. I stayed there for about 45 minutes and loved every second.”

A moment Lambert was denied in 1952.

Source : Blick