Emergency bivouac at Camp V after the 1997 Everest summit push

The emergency bivouac at Camp V after the 1997 Everest summit push turned a threatened descent into a night of improvised care. The Indonesian summiters, delayed until evening and short of oxygen, crowded into a tent with two sections of its poles missing. Anatoli Boukreev, Vladimir Bashkirov, and Evgeny Vinogradski kept them alive by sharing the remaining oxygen, preparing hot water, and working in turns until morning. The survival of the team made possible a cautious descent; only afterward did Boukreev return to the task of covering Scott Fischer’s body.

The delayed descent

The summit party reached the South Summit at 5:00 p.m., moving painfully slowly over old ropes that Apa Sherpa had pieced together for the traverse. Boukreev came last, with the team members moving ahead. Dawa Sherpa was waiting at the South Summit. Misirin repeatedly fell during the descent, then staggered up and continued. Iwan had disconnected from the rope while using Evgeny Vinogradski’s oxygen and fell at the fixed-line junction; Vinogradski caught him and pulled him back onto the rope, preventing a fall of more than one hundred meters.

Asmujiono was moving well and descended with the Sherpas. Boukreev took the lead, using his headlamp to light the trail in the twilight. By 7:30 p.m., all the Indonesian members had reached Camp V with him. Bashkirov and Vinogradski arrived about an hour later. The long, slow arrival left little time before night and cold made further movement more dangerous.

A shelter improvised from scarce supplies

The party’s shelter was a tent missing two sections of its poles, functioning more like a large bivouac sack than a proper camp. Inside were a stove, pots, gas, a Karrimat, and two full oxygen bottles. Six people crowded into the tent as the temperature dropped. The interior was considerably more hospitable than the exposed ground outside, and the absence of wind offered a temporary reprieve.

Apa Sherpa wanted to descend with Dawa Sherpa. Boukreev allowed him to go, arranging for radio contact in the morning. The group remaining at Camp V therefore had to manage the night with the people and equipment on hand, without treating the compromised tent as a secure or fully equipped camp.

Oxygen and teamwork through the night

The two oxygen bottles could not provide continuous support to every exhausted climber. Boukreev and Bashkirov alternated moving the mask among the three Indonesian summiters, stretching the supply across the night. When one climber was left too long without the bottle, he would cry or pray. The rotation turned oxygen into a shared, intermittent resource rather than an individual reserve.

Vinogradski began brewing hot water as soon as he arrived and continued through the long night. Bashkirov, Vinogradski, and Boukreev quietly took turns at the work. Their cooperation was practical and sustained: hot water, oxygen, and attention had to be supplied repeatedly, while the exhausted climbers endured the intervals between them. The team made it through by working together.

Morning descent and Fischer’s burial

Morning brought calm weather and clear views of Lhotse, Makalu, and Kanchenjunga, while sunlight illuminated Everest’s summit. The group brewed one final round of water and gave everyone another drink. No one had frostbite. The oxygen was exhausted, but the Indonesian climbers’ acclimatization and the long night of gradually going without the bottle had eased their dependence on it. They moved slowly, but they could move; expecting Apa and the Sherpas at the South Col to come up to meet them, the party began descending in daylight.

Once Boukreev judged the team’s situation stable, he turned to his personal commitment on the mountain. At 8,400 meters he searched for Fischer, whom the party had passed within thirty meters during the ascent in darkness. Boukreev had carried a farewell flag bearing messages from Fischer’s wife and friends, intending to cover him, but had left the flag at the summit when he could not be sure he would find Fischer while responsible for the climbers. With the immediate danger past, Boukreev and Vinogradski found Fischer, who was almost completely covered by snow. They covered him with snow and rocks and marked the location with a nearby ice-axe shaft. Boukreev left the flag flying from the summit, linking the night’s survival to his unfinished promise to honor his former climbing partner.