Before Paul and I left to climb Mt Everest in 2006, we read as much as we could about the mountain and particularly about the accidents and disasters that have occurred over the years.  Although it was a pretty morbid way to begin our climb, the reason we did this was to understand what went wrong and what could have been done to avoid those tragedies.  We combined this information with our past experience and set ourselves several “rules” about the way we would climb Everest.  But we didn’t share these with anyone because we wondered whether this seemed a bit naïve and whether we really knew what we were talking about.

Since climbing Everest last year, it seems to us that a lot of people don’t have a clear idea of how they are going to climb and that many of the lessons learnt in those tragedies (particularly 1996) are not being applied by lots of climbers.  Our experience and discussions with other climbers, has helped us to add to our list of rules that Paul will be following these during his climb this year.  A lot of these things seem like common-sense, but what’s common-sense at sea-level can often become a lot less obvious once the judgement-cloud of altitude sets in.  (In fact, part of my role at basecamp this year will be to remind Paul of these climbing rules and help him make decisions up high.) 

Although you can’t plan for every situation, we think that having a set of guidelines is extremely useful, which is why we’ve decided to share them here.  Yes, we still risk sounding naïve and there are certainly other people more qualified than us to put something like this up.  But we haven’t found anything like this so we feel it’s irresponsible not to share what we’ve learnt.  If you’re a climber yourself, or you know someone that is, please encourage them to read this.  At the very least, it may encourage other climbers to form their own guidelines for their Everest climb – which is much better than starting without any kind of plan.

So here are our Everest safety rules…

• Never climb alone – Mistakes happen when people are on their own – often due to poor judgement due to altitude thinking.  Climbing in a pair, or in a small group avoids problems and gives you a much higher chance of getting out of a problem.  For this reason, Paul and I each hired a personal Sherpa last year because we knew we’d climb at different paces on summit day.  Given the total investment you’re making in the climb, this is a small cost to pay.  When climbing with someone else, you also need to decide what you will do if one of you needs to turn back (Paul and I had already decided that if one of us had to turn around the other one would continue so we didn’t have to think about it when it actually happened).  However, even if you’re with a guide or Sherpa, you need to think for yourself – everyone is susceptible to the influence of altitude and their judgement may be more impaired than yours.
• Set a turn-around time for summit day – Anyone that has read Into Thin Air probably presumes that all climbers do this, but for some reason this is not talked about (perhaps it’s uncool?) and hardly any of the climbers we spoke to had a clear idea about this.  As it turned out, no-one needed to worry but it makes a lot of sense to have a clear turn-around time in mind (mine was 1pm and I ended up getting to the summit before 8am, but the conditions were good).
• Leave early for the summit – If you are taking a long time and run into trouble, it’s much better to have the whole day of daylight to get yourself down.  Weather seems more stable in the mornings and more likely to change later in the day.  (I left for the summit at 9:30pm and Paul left at 10:30pm).
• Do not climb in bad weather – obviously you can get caught out unexpectedly, but if the weather looks bad or the forecast looks bad, don’t go.  One of the challenges with Everest is being patient and waiting for the right time.  At sea level it’s character building to push through during bad weather, but at high altitudes, it’s just stupid.  
• Keep rotations in perspective - if the weather turns bad on an acclimatisation rotation – don’t panic.  Stay put at camp or consider where the safest place to sit it out will be – turn back if necessary.  We saw people climbing in really bad weather on acclimatisation rotations.  There is really no need to do this, as an extra day waiting for good weather won’t impact the overall climb.  If bad weather comes in whilst you are half way between camps, it’s much faster and safer to come down than push on up.
• Carry your own emergency equipment
  Spare mitts – several people have dropped mitts and suffered frost-bite as a result
  Lots of chemical hand warmers – if you get cold, you need a way to warm up.  These can be purchased online very cheaply.
  Emergency drugs – we carried Dexamethasone (in pre-loaded syringes on summit day) and Nifedipine tablets
  Radio - every climber should carry their own radio (surprisingly, many groups don’t have enough radios for everyone and encourage people to share, despite the fact that groups often end up spread out across a big distance)
  Spare batteries – for torches and radios
• Get through the icefall early – By 10am, the icefall is heating up and becomes less stable so the earlier you can get through, the safer you’ll be.  Last year, the climbers in our group would usually start at about 6am.  However, the Sherpas would usually leave at around 4am – and they travel faster than us Westerners.  In hindsight, we should have left earlier – probably at 5am, but letting the Sherpas go ahead.  It’s dark, cold and generally unpleasant at that time, but a lot better than getting caught under a toppling ice-block.
• Clip into all the ropes – a lot of people don’t ever clip, or just clip into ropes where they think it’s necessary.  But history shows that climbers aren’t particularly good judges of this and lots of accidents have happened where people have fallen in places where they could have clipped into a rope.  Some argue that it slows you down and the safest thing is to get through the icefall quickly.  That’s true but more accidents have happened from falls and clipping really takes hardly any extra time. 
• Don’t use the icefall for training – when at basecamp, lots of climbers like to do day hikes or climbs as training for acclimatisation.  The icefall is dangerous, so don’t do this here – go up Kala Patar (again!).  Last year I did this 3 times.  Partly people are anxious to test out the ladders, but you’ll have plenty of opportunity for this later on. :)
• Wear helmets in the icefall and on the Lhotse Face – Falling ice, rock or dropped carabiners are all dangers here and it’s no extra effort to wear a helmet.  You’ll be amazed at how many people are not wearing helmets.
• Check your oxygen – once you’re at altitudes where you need oxygen, everything is difficult.  But no matter how hard it is and how tired you feel, your life is relying on the oxygen functioning correctly, so you need to take full responsibility for your own system.  Paul knows first-hand how it feels to have something go wrong here and we have come up with a couple of suggestions.
  Double check your own flow rate – check it yourself and ask someone else to check it for you.  Ask them to tell you what flow rate it is on, not to confirm what you are saying.
  Check that the regulator is delivering the correct flow of oxygen – After Paul ran out of oxygen at 8750 metres, it now seems obvious that every climber should check that their regulator is actually delivering the proper flow-rate.  But how to do this?  On Paul’s second attempt he noted that the new regulator and bottle that he was using seemed to be delivering much more oxygen the unit he was using the night before.  He also felt much better aerobically, despite it being his second attempt in 24 hours.  Somewhat alarmed by this and worried that he might run out of oxygen again, he took off his pack and noted the pressure reading of the oxygen tank.  One hour later he took his pack off again and noted the pressure.  By also knowing the flow rate and the number of hours that a full bottle should last for, he was able to determine that it was in fact delivering the right amount of oxygen.  To give a specific example, if your starting pressure is 150psi and the flow-rate is such that the bottle should last for 10 hours, after 1 hour you would expect the pressure to read 135psi (a drop of 1 tenth of 150).  If it’s less than that, you’ll need to turn the flow-rate down in order for it to last 10 hours. By turning the flow rate down, you will be receiving the correct amount of oxygen, not a higher amount.
  Take Flow-Rate - Time conversions with you - You need to know beforehand how many hours your bottles will last for at a given flow rate and you should have a printout of these calculations with you (or write one up at basecamp).
• Wait for the right day – Don’t attempt to summit on the first day of good weather, or the first day when the lines are being fixed.  This is a recipe for delays and bottle-necks which could be costly
• Don’t try to set a predetermined date for a summit attempt – We were amazed at the people that came to Everest with a date in mind of when they would summit.  It obviously depends on weather, the stage of rope fixing, the state of your health, and many other factors that you can’t possibly control.  By open-minded and patient
• Only climb when healthy – You’re never going to feel 100% at altitude but make sure you’re not too far away from this when you start out.  Believe me, it’s hard enough, so don’t make it an impossible task
• Use oxygen as first-aid - If you have any health concerns up high, oxygen is the main thing that will help – don’t hesitate to use it (it won’t ruin your acclimatisation!)

So that's it.  We’d be interested in hearing your thoughts on these – perhaps you have more that you could add or you disagree with something here?  Fiona