You are leaving nationalgeographic.com and different terms of use and privacy policy will apply.
A helicopter prepares to lift off early Monday to begin ferrying expedition members down from high camps on Everest. Roughly a 100 climbers, guides, and Sherpas had been stranded at Camps 1 and 2 after a massive earthquake in Nepal set off avalanches in the region.
Updated April 27 at 6 p.m.
Scores of climbers who'd been trapped on Mount Everest in the wake of Saturday's earthquake in Nepal were were evacuated by helicopter on Monday.
An estimated 200 climbers were acclimatizing in a narrow glacial valley known as the Western Cwm—where Camp 1 and Camp 2 are located—when the magnitude 7.8 quake struck, triggering a catastrophic avalanche that blasted through Base Camp, killing 21 and critically injuring dozens.
The quake also severed the route that is set through the dangerously unstable Khumbu Icefall each year with fixed ropes and aluminum ladders, cutting off the climbers’ only way off the mountain and forcing Monday’s helicopter rescue.
Initially, expedition leaders thought they could repair the route through the icefall and bring most of the climbers down that way. On Sunday, a helicopter dropped additional technical gear at Camp I, and a team of Sherpas and foreign guides attempted to re-establish the route from the top back down to the ruined Base Camp. Another team dispatched from Base Camp tried to re-establish the route from the bottom-up.
Three Sherpas were reportedly killed in that effort, pushing the death toll on the mountain to at least 24.
“Sadly, three more Sherpas died in the Icefall, trying to repair the damaged route,” mountaineer Elia Saikaly wrote on Facebook. “There was a subsequent avalanche that took out most of the ladders in the Icefall.”
As Monday dawned, those in Base Camp and on the mountain had decided to abandon hopes of re-establishing the route and to focus on organizing a helicopter rescue for those stranded above the icefall instead.
At first light, a squadron of several helicopters arrived on scene and began to ferry climbers down. “At Camp One, we were up before dawn, boiling cups of instant coffee and hurriedly packing,” wrote Dave Hahn, a senior guide with Rainier Mountaineering, Inc, in a blog posted from Base Camp. “It wasn’t going to be an ideal scenario, by any means… Being ‘rescued’ from 20,000 feet (6,100 meters) on Mount Everest, along with perhaps 180 of our closest friends… But we weren’t likely to get any better offers…”
Efforts were hampered by the fact that above 20,000 feet, the payload of even the powerful AS350 B3 helicopters is drastically reduced, meaning that only two people could be transported at a time on the four-minute trip to Base Camp. “A fear of the team leaders was a helicopter mob scene ala Saigon ‘75, but we’d arrayed our helipads in a way that didn’t allow for mobbing and everybody seemed to understand the need for superior social skills on this day,” Hahn wrote.
All told, more than 150 individuals are now safely below the icefall, although a few more remain in Camp I, and the operation will continue on Tuesday.
Dan Mazur, an American guide who was among those helicoptered to Base Camp, tweeted: “Helicopters flew to # EverestC1 today, rescuing stranded climbers & Sherpas. @ 1:30pm, clouds & No more helis. Hope for tomorrow.”
See how the earthquake affected Kathmandu. (Warning: some photographs contain graphic material.)
Mountains of debris have piled up in Nepal's capital. Here, rescue workers search for survivors on Sunday in Bhaktapur, near Kathmandu.
Roads in and around Kathmandu were split apart as a result of the quake and its aftershocks. Here, Nepalese people inspect a crack made dangerously wide by the earthquake.
In Swyambhu, an area in Kathmandu, rescuers save a man from the rubble on Sunday. His friend, next to him, was killed.
An avalanche triggered by the earthquake struck a section of Mount Everest Base Camp on Saturday, just as the 2015 climbing season was beginning. At least 18 are thought be dead there, with helicopter evacuations underway.
In Bhaktapur, Nepal, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a temple collapsed around a statue of the Buddha. Scores of other temples and religious sites have been reported destroyed. The exact toll of the damage is not yet known.
A relative of one of the victims identifies a dead family member in Bhaktapur, a town southeast of Kathmandu.
The body of a person killed in the earthquake lies ready for cremation on Sunday.
Nepalese families gathered in a field to cremate their family members near Bhaktapur, Nepal.
Two men search through debris in Bhaktapur as part of rescue efforts. Multiple aftershocks have shaken the area and complicated the arrival of supplies and personnel by aid organizations.
In a hospital in Kathmandu, a man named Suresh Parihar plays with his daughter Sandhya. Parihar was injured in the earthquake.
Buildings in and around Durbar Square, a site surrounded by ancient palaces that are listed as UNESCO World Heritage sites, collapsed as a result of the Kathmandu earthquake. Rescuers cleared the debris Saturday afternoon in the search for survivors.
People tried to free this man in Kathmandu Saturday even as aftershocks continued shaking the area.
Photograph by Narandra Shrestha, EPA
The facades of buildings in Lalitpur District, on the outskirts of Kathmandu, fell into the streets on Saturday. Ripples from the earthquake were felt around all of Nepal and in several neighboring countries.
Photograph by Prakash Mathema, AFP, Getty Images
Some people who had been buried by falling debris were rescued as aftershocks continued to shake the region.
Photograph by Narendra Shrestha, EPA
More than just government rescue workers contributed to the search and rescue effort in the hours after Saturday’s quake. These workers carry a woman who was injured after the historic Dharahara Tower in Kathmandu collapsed.
The Dharara Tower, a 14-story cultural landmark built in 1832, was reduced to a 33-foot (10 meters) stump after the quake. The tower had been open to visitors for the past decade.
Rescue workers set up clinics in the streets to respond to victims on Saturday.
A man passes near a collapsed temple near Durbar Square, the historic site of palaces in Kathmandu.
With hospitals overtaxed and in uncertain structural condition, injured people received treatment outside in the streets. The Red Cross said it had thousands of aid items available for deployment and more on the way from neighboring countries.
A man in Kathmandu surveyed the rubble in part of Kathmandu on Saturday. International aid officials said that the full extent of the damage and its death toll wouldn’t be known for days at least, or possibly much longer.
“Around 15 climbers still to be heli evacuated tomorrow, weather permitting, from camp 1,” Romanian mountaineer Alex Gavan tweeted. “Everybody else down to base camp. Huge credit 4 pilots,” he wrote.
Alan Arnette, a climber and noted Everest blogger, was one of those lifted to safety. He posted: “No one ever in real danger at C1 and C2, plenty of food and supplies.”
For those rescued from Everest’s flanks, the return to Base Camp was surreal. “There was no back-slapping. No cheering. No high fives,” Hahn wrote. “It was as if an enormous bomb had detonated. We each walked slowly through the obliterated camps, stopping to understand how much force had bent this or that bit of steel.”
Freddie Wilkinson is a writer and climber based in New Hampshire.
Copyright © 1996-2015 National Geographic Society.
Copyright © 2015-2020 National Geographic Partners, LLC. All rights reserved