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Leo Dickinson's thoughts
- before the expedition:
"If Messner and Habeler were to be successful this time in reaching
the summit of Everest without oxygen, then it would bring the whole story
neatly back full circle to those early pioneers: Odell, Somervell, Norton,
Mallory and Irvine
. They would have approved of an ascent without
the use of "English Air", as the Sherpas affectionately called
the oxygen bottles. I am quite sure that Mallory would also have been
in sympathy with Messner's "by fair means" ethic, by which Messner
means, quite simply, giving the mountain a chance. For a man who has climbed
over 2,000 serious alpine routes (and the majority of them solo), who
has been to the highest points in all the major continents, and who had,
at that time, already scaled 3 of the world's "8,000-meter"
peaks, one could be forgiven for questioning who was being fair to whom.
Weighed against this, however, Messner has lost all his toes through frostbite,
his brother was killed climbing with him on Nanga Parbat, and his wife,
Uschi, left him because of the time and obsessive love he lavishes on
his mountains. Still, in climbing matters, he clearly loads the dice very
heavily in his favor, and nothing is allowed to stand in his way."
- after the expedition:
"Reinhold made it to the top. But the peril was not over. There
was still the danger of brain damage - or, in Reinhold's case, further
brain damage. The chances were that this would first manifest itself in
the form of burst blood-vessels in the eye-ball, loss of memory, impaired
speech functions and the sudden, irrational urge to participate in stupid
television programs. Most of these symptoms duly appeared. Nevertheless,
Reinhold's achievement could not be gainsaid. He and his friends have
proved that it is not enough to risk your neck. It is in the nature of
man to risk his brains as well."
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