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Comment by beilabs | Hacker News Reader

A most excellent article.

I was based in the Kathmandu AP office for over two years. Every week during climbing season I heard of the fatalities on the mountain. I understand why people attempt it, the varying reasons are immense from personal lifetime goals to fundraising to pure ego.

Many attempt it on the cheap with poor training and physical fitness. Remember that altitude sickness and frostbite is a great leveler of people regardless of your race, financial status or intelligence. It can strike anyone at anytime.

Say goodbye to your loved ones and ensure your estate is in order before you do this trek, there is a huge chance that you might never see your family ever again.

By the way, I'm heading to base camp in two years and have an apartment that I rent out in Patan if anyone is coming for a short trip over. Though the startup scene is small in Kathmandu, we exist...

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> fundraising

I've never seen the point of behind giving someone money "for charity" to do something they can't afford on their own. It's all about them and not the charity.

You'd be surprised how many try it....and even more how many get away with it. Many do it for PR for their own brand / company.

Usually when I see people do that kind of thing the money raised is a side effort and all going to charity. They're doing the event (climbing, running, etc.) anyway, not using the donations to fund the event. I'm not saying it doesn't happen where people use the donations to fund their event but it's not something I see very often and I don't understand why anyone would donate to it.

In my opinion, this is the way to go: all the funds go to the org. or don't fund raise.

Fundraising for yourself is a little strange, even if you use, "part" of the money raised to donate to a charity. Technically, the money you collect is taxed, which is a big chunk of what you've raised. You would need to start a non-profit for this to be 100% kosher IMHO, but even then, I've caught "organizations" that just say they're a non-profit or are, "waiting non-profit status" and it turns out to be a big scam. It really irks me, as it casts a bad shade on people doing it the right way. Just sell something to raise the funds - anything: stickers, a t-shirt, a dinner date, and drop the whole charade. Using a platform like Go Fund Me sounds fine with me, as long as you're giving everyone deliverables. There's too big of a chance that you won't put on the trip altogether, and it's tough luck for your backers.

Saying that, I have done something similar - partially funded a trip and gave some to another org, but it was for a local needle exchange organization, which operated in a major grey area as what they were doing wasn't legal, but was done with the knowledge of the local police. Since then, needle exchange has become legal. The experience was rough - fundraising is just another way to employ yourself - it's just easier to find another job, honestly.

Alan Arnette is a standup guy. Wish him luck with his unfortunate leg injury and recovery!

If my enemy were unhealthy and trying to find a way to afford going to Everest, it may be worth it to me to pay for them to risk dying.

Marathons wind me up something chronic, charities dump hundreds/thousands of pounds buying places to "sell" to runners at a profit. The runners fund this by convincing people to give them money towards it, and asserting the money goes to charity.

Well, some of it does, but a massive chunk goes on paying for the slot they're running in. Because they want to do it for fun/validation/other.

I don't think you are correct about this at all, and since you said "pounds" I assume you're talking about the London Marathon (though most others are similar).

With the London Marathon, charities buy their spots for £300 each[1] and get well over £1000 (sometimes much more) in return for each spot. Marathons are very expensive to organize, so it is not unreasonable for the organizer to charge for the entires. In addition, many spots that charities get are given out totally free of charge.

In all, millions of dollars and pounds are raised through these programs.

https://www.virginmoneylondonmarathon.com/en-gb/news-media/m...

Of course not all of these events are bad, but there is a very real problem in many of them where often none or very little of the large entry fee goes to charity at all - only additional donations do. The organisers of charity sporting events rarely make this distinction clear.

The problem was especially acute when cycling exploded in the UK following Bradley Wiggin's and the British Team Sky's huge successes at the Tour de France. Charity cycling events called "sportives" sprang up all over the country, many of them badly organised and poorly run, with often very little of the funds raised going to charity. Basically a bunch of people saw an opportunity to make serous cash, given entry fees where often over 100 quid per person depending on the "package" you selected. It all kinda tied into the "cycling is the new golf" scene that gripped a lot of business people. The kinds of people vain enough to drop 15 grand on a full Sky Team issue Pinarello bike often like to pay for fancy events to show off their exspsensive habit. The guardian did some good coverage of the phenomenon a couple of years ago.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/bike-blog/2012/jun/2...

I know next to nothing about the biking world, so this is interesting to me. But the comment I was replying to was specifically calling out Marathons which, for the most part (at least the majors), tend to raise a lot of money for charity. But thanks for the info on biking I will definitely read up on it.

Having spoken to people running charities which pay for the slots, and who then have to chase people to match their commitments in terms of fund raising (and more recently the introduction of personal liability if they don't raise enough) - I think it's absurd to claim this isn't the case.

Of course millions are raised. Millions are raised by the investment funds into which charities pour their excess capital, and the adverts they make, and the people they employ to stand on the street.

Charities are fund raising businesses which put profits into causes. If you're fine with donating £10 so someone can run a marathon and £20 to charity - good on you. I am not

In the US, marathon fundraising usually works pretty differently, in that the fundraising efforts are separate from the event itself. Anyone can enter the Chicago Marathon for $195 and can then choose to participate in whatever fundraising they like (e.g. Team in Training to support Lymphoma research). I'd be curious to see an event that works the way you describe. Do you have a link?

Boston Marathon: you can qualify by time or by raising money for a charity.

Qualifying by time is out of reach for most recreational runners, and there are only a few thousand charity spots, so people regularly raise 5 figures in order to run.

http://www.baa.org/utilities/charities/official-charity-prog...

Just a point of interest with Alan -- he has raised a ton of money for Alzheimer's research through his climbing. I can speak for others, but he's the real deal an an amazing guy. Had a chance to talk to him prior to my Mont Blanc climb a few years ago. Class act.

Alan suffered a pretty major injury to his leg a few months ago, it's unclear if he will be able to climb mountains again, but we all are pretty sure he will find a way.

http://www.alanarnette.com/blog/2017/05/05/broken-leg-update...

You beat me to it. The original comment is ironic given that author is funded by charity. Alan is a refreshing character among all the gear sponsored social media "pros".

> I've never seen the point of behind giving someone money "for charity" to do something they can't afford on their own. It's all about them and not the charity.

TBH a lot of people see startups in the same light.

But startups usually have more positive externalities than an Everest climb.

Honestly I think that opinion is purely relative to your position. (not you personally, but to one's)

I would say the complete opposite. Most tech startups are pointless with no redeeming qualities and undertaken by pure ego and culture aimed at being mega rich regardless of how they claim they are going to change the world

Nitpick that the 'trek' is to basecamp generally and fairly safe - the odd heart attack amongst the unfit. The climb above there to the summit is the dangerous bit.

Agreed. I have heard of many cases of evacs from Base camp. There are often deals worked out with chopper companies that allow them to claim off your insurance and you get a cheaper trip down the mountain (unnecessary evacuations, fast rides down).

It's true. But it can and does kill fit people occasionally too. Some 25% of people are genetically predisposed to altitude sickness above 4000m according to a researcher I met while walking that trek myself. Base camp is well above 5000m.

Amazing trek though. One of the greatest experiences of my life.

I was flown out of base-camp with pulmonary edema along with a Sherpa on a climbing team who was dying from the same thing. Happens to everyone. This is probably the biggest scare if you're doing the trek to base-camp. Drink plenty of water. Don't go too fast. Try not to catch cold before your trek. If you can, get your hands on some meds that help you acclimate easier/faster. And I almost forgot, get yourself travel insurance. Costs $90 but could potentially save you a $10K heli ride out of the mountains and a couple of grand in hospital expenses if shit hits the fan.

> Drink plenty of water.

Cannot stress on this enough.

Dimox is usually advised for anyone doing a high altitude trek in which case one has to drink more water than usual.

> Drink plenty of water.

FYI, this is true anytime you go from sea level to any altitude. Live on the coast and go to Denver for ski trip? Drinking a ton of water will help your body acclimate faster.

Go easy on alcohol too. It hits you way harder and faster at altitude.

>> get your hands on some meds that help you acclimate easier/faster

Do such drugs safely assist with acclimation, or do they mostly mask symptoms? It would be very dangerous to take them if it's the latter. I'm thinking of any similarity to pain killers - just because you can't feel the pain does not mean you should be running around trying to operate at 100%.

We had a number of people in my team who started taking prescribed drugs 2 weeks prior to the trip. Now, I never took anything, but from us measuring blood oxygen levels a few times a day, the drugs seemed to have helped absorb and retain oxygen levels in your blood stream better. It didn't seem to mask symptoms. In fact, by the time we got to base-camp nearly every single person on the team had some mild symptoms of altitude sickness (headache & dizziness). It's just that nobody's symptoms escalated to a full-blown HAPE (except for mine that is). Having said that, I don't think anything but proper acclimatization will help you with HACE. Once you get it, which typically happens at very high altitudes, you're pretty much screwed which I believe happens nearly every season on Everest climbs.

I've carried Diamox but never used it. I'm probably pretty lucky in that I've never had a noticeable issue at modest (3-4K meter) elevations and I've only had bad headaches a couple times when getting back from climbing up to around the 6K meter range.

I haven't been up to that altitude for a fairly long time. I can't say I'm up on the various recommended protocols.

To put a number on "huge chance", I think it's about 1% of summits in recent years.

Probably less if you just count clients not guides/Sherpas, and less if you expand to include climbers that don't end up attempting the summit.

A 1% fatality rate definitely qualifies as huge. The statistical value of life in the US, which is inferred from what people are willing to pay to avoid risk, is ~$10M. So a 1% risk is worth about $100k, i.e., this is something like what the median person would pay to avoid that risk. Non-expert climbers who pay for help to climb Everest probably have above average wealth and hence would probably pay even more to avoid this risk. It's sizeable. At least as risky as spaceflight.

For all time, Everest fatalities are 4% of summits. Of the 14 8k peaks, it ranks 11. The "huge" caught me too. At 30% fatality to summits, Annapurna and K2 are huge.

lol nobody thinks their race is going to protect them from mountains. Where on earth do you people get this nonsense?

From reputable publications:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/sherpas-evolved-liv...

Didn't I just see an article about Sherpas having a quirk of their metabolism that makes them better adapted for it?

Both you and OP are bizzare. Race does matter, sherpas are genetically different for altitude. It's not level.

But I did read their incredible carrying capacity seems to just be training. Which makes sense since that's a recent thing.

Please don't post uncivilly, even when someone else is wrong.

So you do think that financial status and intelligence can protect you from frostbite.

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