TRAPPED INSIDE A GLACIER
48 | May• 2019
the walls and finding his footing,
each step taking excruciating min-
utes as he tried to gather his energ y.
The crevasse was tight enough for
him to chimney his way up now, and
he braced his back against the wall.
Stab, kick, shift, repeat. After about
four hours in the crevasse, All could
see the glow of the sun through a thin
crust of snow.
Finally he swung an axe upwards
and broke through. A tiny patch of
blue sky appeared. As All cleared
the snow, making the hole wider, he
had the distinct feeling that he had
just dug himself out of his own grave.
He hauled himself up and lay there,
halfway in and halfway out, utterly
exhausted and unable to move.
Five minutes later, with a final
burst of energ y, he forced his body to
flop forwards onto solid ground. He
staggered to his feet and immediately
collapsed again. He couldn’t walk. He
could barely get to his knees. That’s
when he realised how much trouble
he was still in.
In the Himalayas, death from
hypothermia comes quickly. All was
a three-minute walk away from his
tent, but it might as well have been
three kilometres.You didn’t come
this far not to make it, he told him-
self. He pulled his body forwards on
his stomach, shivering in agony as
he dragged his broken ribs across
the ground. The short walk took two
hours of crawling. It was late after-
noon when he finally lunged into the
tent. All reached for his handheld
satellite communicator. He knew he
wouldn’t survive unless his partners
reached him. He was bleeding inter-
nally and needed to be rescued.
The communicator could only send
messages, not make phone calls, and
at the moment, it was connected tothe Facebook page of an organisa-
tion he’d co-founded, the American
Climber Science Program. Back home
in Kentucky, it was 4am. Everyone he
knew was likely to be asleep, but he
prayed someone would see his cry for
help. With numb fingers he typed out
a message: “Please call Global Rescue.
John broken arm, ribs, internal bleed-
ing. Fell 20m crevasse. Climbed out.
Himlung camp 2. Please hurry.”FROM HER HOUSE INHawaii, biol-
ogist Rebecca Cole was getting ready
for bed when she decided to log on
to Facebook. When she saw John All’s
message, her heart sank.HE PULLED HIS BODY FORWARDS,
DRAGGING HIS BROKEN RIBS ACROSS ICE