After hours with little progress in deep snow, Tyler Andrews has aborted another attempt to achieve the fastest ever Everest summit.
Again, all went well for the American runner on the lower half of the mountain. Six hours into the run, he reached 7,000m, following a direct route towards the Geneva Spur and skipping the usual location of Camp 3. However, some 12 hours after he set off, as he approached the South Col, his progress slowed and then stopped at 7,900m.
At around noon Nepal time, Andrews’ companion Chris Fisher posted the following on Instagram:
Instagram post by Chris Fisher today at around 10:30 am Nepal time.
It was unclear if Andrews would continue for the next two hours, but the Base Camp team had warned that the GPS signal was poor and updates would be scarce. Finally, Fisher shared the final decision in another social media story:
Fisher’s most recent post on Instagram confirms that Andrews turned around.
Second-best mark so far
Andrews has surpassed his previous attempt from earlier this week, when he turned around at 7,400m. However, his latest registered altitude of 7,900m (according to his last tracker update) is not the highest point he has ever reached on the mountain. Earlier this year, on May 27, Andrews reached 8,450m, just below the South Summit, before turning around.
Tyler Andrews’ progress graph at 1 pm Nepal time. Image: Everest.racecast.io
Tyler hoped to reach the summit of Everest from Base Camp — without using supplementary oxygen — within 20 hours. This was his fifth attempt in five months. However, the two latest climbs have been in the post-monsoon season, with the mountain virtually deserted and covered in fresh snow.
There was a second team on the south side of Everest, but all their members left the mountain earlier this week after Andrzej Bargiel of Poland and Lakpa Sherpa reached the summit on Monday. Bargiel skied back to Base Camp.
