Review: Into Thin Air

Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster by Jon Krakauer

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The tallest mountain I have ever climbed is Peñalara, the highest peak of the Guadarrama range. Standing at 2,428 meters above sea level, it is not even a third as high as Everest. With a train station that transports visitors most of the way up, and no steep cliffs or otherwise difficult terrain, for most of the year it requires no special skill or equipment to climb to the top.

And yet even this seemingly harmless mountain can be dangerous under the right conditions. I discovered this when I decided to visit one day in March, some years ago, during a cold snap that covered the mountain with snow—probably for the last time of the season. Wearing two pairs of pants, two undershirts, a hoodie, and my winter jacket, I ascended up the main route from the Puerto de Cotos.

The going was relatively easy until I got above the tree line. There, wind blew blasts of snow into my face, making it difficult to see. The air was so cold that I put on the feeble mask I had in my pocket from COVID times, just to protect my nose. The ground was covered in a layer of ice, requiring me sometimes to stomp through it, as I was just wearing hiking boots and had no crampons.

Even so, I made it to the top without too much trouble, and quickly turned to descend. Yet when I got halfway down, I decided that it was still relatively early; I wanted to do a little more exploring. I knew that there was a little lake somewhere on the mountain and I decided that I’d pay it a visit on my way to the train. A fork in the path took me to the Refugio Zabala, an emergency shelter built in 1927. There, I saw a path leading through the icy snow, down into a valley below. For some reason, I figured that this led to the lake.

But the path quickly grew too steep to walk down on the icy ground. Rather than turn back, however, I made the stupidest decision of the day, and slid down the icy surface on my butt all the way to the bottom, digging into the surface with my bare hands to slow myself down. When I skidded to a stop, I figured the path would continue. I was flummoxed, then, when it diverged into several directions. The air was foggy and a light wisp of snow was falling, making it impossible to see where the different paths led. To make matters worse, my phone didn’t have any data, and I had no offline maps.

Choosing what struck me as the most likely direction, I started walking, and soon found myself stumbling over icy rocks on the side of a steep hill. One mistep and I could easily have gone tumbling. After about ten minutes of slipping and sliding, the path petered out, leaving me at the base of a large icy slope. I sat down on the ice and contemplated trying to claw my way to the top of the hill, but I decided it was too risky. Besides, I had no idea if I was even going the right direction.

So I retraced my steps, tripping over the rocky path until I reached the bottom of the hill that I had so unwisely slid down. It was manifestly impossible to go back up the slope, as the ground was frozen solid. To make matters worse, a storm seemed to be blowing in, reducing visibility to a minimum. Lost in a sea of white fog, I began to panic. The temperature was well below zero and would likely get much colder. What would happen if I twisted my ankle or fell and hit my head? Could I survive a night exposed to the elements?

Just then, I heard a dog barking, and then voices in the distance. Without hesitating, I headed straight for the noise, even though the route took me off the paths and sent me scurrying over piles of slick boulders. I emerged onto a wooden path, where a group of hikers were chatting. They were well-prepared for the weather, each one sporting an impermeable jacket, crampons, and walking sticks.

Suddenly embarrassed, I asked them, as nonchalantly as I could, if this was the path to the train station. “Yes,” they assured me. “Are you lost? Want to come with us?” “Oh no, I’m fine,” I said, and walked as fast as I could down the walkway. Sure enough, in about an hour I was back in civilization, cradling a cup of hot chocolate from the station café.

It is obvious from this story that I had to make a lot of stupid decisions in a row to put myself in such a precarious situation. Even so, this modest experience also shows how unforgiving a mountain can be. After all, this was a peak I had climbed many times before—a national park frequented by tens of thousands of visitors. The idea that I could be in any danger struck me as silly. But all it took was a bit of fog and ice for me to get completely lost. A single slip could have been fatal.

I’ve elected to tell this anecdote because I have very little else to say about this book. It is absolutely gripping and made me think about cold, altitude, oxygen, and the strange impulse to defy death and challenge nature. I will only add that, if Krakauer hoped to combat the commercialization of Everest by telling this story, he did not succeed. Everest is now growing dangerously crowded. You can look up recent videos of dozens of climbers waiting in queues to stand on the summit. I can’t say I get the appeal.

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