Allen Iain

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Biografie:
Ama Dablam Attempt. Iain Allen, and Ian Howell of Kenya, Alastair Stevenson of Australia, Americans Bruce Kleppinger and I attempted Ama Dablam’s south ridge in April. Stevenson and I established Base Camp at 15,000 feet on March 31 and Advanced Base at 16,500 feet on April 4. The others arrived on April 7. On April 8 Stevenson and I occupied Camp I at 19,000 feet, to be joined there by Allen and Howell on April 10 and Kleppinger on April 11. The latter was suffering from an unspecified Patagonian parasite and never went above Camp I. The rest of us occupied Camp II on April 15, which is only 500 feet higher than Camp I, but to reach it requires more than a dozen pitches of tricky and exposed traversing. Altitude is gained more quickly above Camp II, and the four of us occupied Camp III at 20,500 feet on April 19. This was the first camp that showed no sign of previous expeditions. Up until now each camp had sported pre-carved tent-sites with the inevitable bits of trash, and the route had been made painfully obvious by residual fixed ropes rendered untrustworthyby the effects of ultra-violet light and ice- and rockfall. Above Camp III, the only glacier camp, the ice became very shallow, hollow and brittle, and would not accept any protection. After a second attempt to climb the upper ice slopes, and in the face of deteriorating weather, on April 20 we opted for descent, reaching Advanced Base the following day.
Skip Horner
Quelle: American Alpine Journal 1987, Vol. 29, Seite 227