Everest Ethical Issues Essay

Up on Everest, one of the harshest environments on planet Earth, the line between ethical and unethical, your moral decisions, begins to blur. In a place where you are fighting for your life, fighting to survive, where do your decisions come into play? Do you fight to keep yourself alive and let others suffer, or do you put your own life on the line to help others? This, is the raw morality of a human being, where a person’s true colours would truly show.

In 1996, one of the worst Everest disasters to date took place, claiming fourteen lives. Out of thirty-three climbers, nineteen would be trapped in the Death Zone- an area above 8000 meters where the air becomes so thin that you are actively dying with every second spent within the zone- when a sudden storm struck on the night of May 10th. Yasuko Namba, Rob Hall, Andy Harris, Doug Hansen, Scott Fischer, Tsewang Samanla, Dorje Morup, and Tsewang Paljor would all end up dying, while Neal Beidleman, Klev Schoening, Charlotte Fox, Tim Madsen, Sandy Pittman, Lene

The first, was when Rob Hall never returned from the summit. Second, when Jon Krakauer, offered his help down the mountain upon passing Beck but did not force it. Soon, he descended with the help from guide Mike Groom, just to become disoriented in the storm with ten other clients. Hours later, when there was a break in the storm, Weathers and four other climbers had been so weakened by their constant battle to live that they were left behind. When Mountain Madness guide Anatoli Boukreev came to rescue those who he could, Beck Weathers, disoriented and hallucinatory, had stood up and disappeared into the storm. The next day, when the storm had calmed, Stuart Hutchinson and a group of Sherpas arrived again to check on the status of Yasuko Namba and Beck Weathers. They were both on the brink of death, and thought to be more of a burden if brought to camp, so Beck Weathers was left for dead yet