Contents [Ski Everest Home] Front page for the Skiing Everest Cybercast [UPDATES] Climbers call from Everest on a sat-phone [The North Side] Climbing guide Eric Simonson describes the Northeast Ridge Route [Meet the Team] The 1997 Everest Ski Expedition members [EVEREST '97] Rich multimedia cybercast from Everest [Sponsors] Companies that supported this effort The Everest Bookstore Click on a book for details and ordering info from The Mountain Zone Bookstore. "Into Thin Air" by Jon Krakauer An epic, first-hand account of the 1996 tragedy. "Everest" by Walt Unsworth Thorough compilation of historic climbs, triumph and tragedy. "Everest Map" by Brad Washburn National Geographic centennial map, Washburn's Everest map and more. "Everest: The West Ridge" by Tom Hornbein The pioneering ascent by Unsoeld and Hornbein. [The Mountain Zone] More stories from The Mountain Zone			Updates From Everest Click here to get the FREE Real Audio Player to hear sat-phone calls. Calonica Base Camp Meeting Reveals Details Tuesday, September 9, 1997 (Everest North Face base camp, Tibet) [Click to hear the sat-phone call.] Transcript: Hi guys, this is Craig Calonica and it is Tuesday, September 9, 9:50pm, Everest base camp. I just got out of a meeting here with the Colombian team, the Spanish Catalan team, and some of the Korean team members involved in the avalanche. I just found out that there were eight of them going up at the same time and it was actually the climbing leader who was killed. They still have not been able to locate the body. All of the teams up at ABC have combined forces and have been searching for him since yesterday with no luck. The area that it covered was over 100 meters wide and nearly 1500 feet long or more — so it was quite a large area. It seems that the participation with all the groups here is really, really nice to see and the fact that everyone is working together so closely and that there are no egos or anything involved really shows a good spirit for everyone up on the mountain here. It's really something special to be around. Anyway, the Korean group and team leader — expedition leader — seem to be in somewhat decent spirits considering what happened. Apparently seven of the eight members were above the climbing team leader when the accident occurred. He was below them and saw that something was happening and shouted up to them to get up and get out of the way. He was trying to move and apparently at that time the face cut loose and took him away. Anyway, that was a lot more than I knew when I sent my last report off to you. At this moment I don't have his name. So, we are leaving up to ABC tomorrow. We're going to take our time so we can acclimatize properly. We're going to do it in three days because going from 17,000 feet to 21,500 feet is not a go up, come down type of thing; it's a go up and sleep up. So we're going take our time; there's no rush. Our Sherpas have been up there now for about four days and everything is getting organized. At soon as the weather stabilizes a bit and the slopes get better, work will begin again to push the route up higher. It's already pushed up to 7800 meters at this point, and weather permitting by the end of the week it'll be up to camp III at 8200 meters and within another week there'll probably be summit attempts occurring. Anyway, that's about it for now. Hope all of you are doing okay. This is Craig Calonica saying goodbye from Everest base camp. — Craig Calonica, Expedition Leader The previous update contains an interview with Craig earlier in the day PREVIOUS UPDATE | UPDATES HOME | NEXT UPDATE

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