Three Springs | whathasgood: As a young high altitude expedition worker, the more you carry, the more you are paid. There is a per kilogram equation for payment, and there is value, both in hard cash and in securing future work, in proving you are good. If you prove you’re good, you get hired next season, possibly recruited by one of the better companies, climbing literally up the mountain and figuratively up the ranks. The best way to do all this is to move fast and carry a lot. And the best way to do that is to dance, possibly unclipped, across the icefall ladders.
And yet. This one potential factor, this one whisper of motivation, the veteran mountaineers did not make mention of when the article posed the question: “Why did Namgya skip a seemingly simple, and potentially life-saving step?”