What began as a hiking trip with friends on the breathtaking slopes on the Tibetan side of Mount Everest has turned into a horrifying ordeal for the 30-year-old Fen Holiday.
Fen and her group departed from Yupa village in Tibet’s Sigatse province on October 1st to trek through the scenic Gama Valley on the eastern side of Mount Everest.
Feng is among hundreds of trekkers who had to evacuate after an unusually high snowfall collapsed on Saturday evening and a covered trail, with hikers stranded around 16,400 feet (5,000 meters).
Xinhua, a Chinese provincial news agency, said about 580 trekkers and more than 300 local guides and porters had arrived safely in the small town of Quadang late Tuesday night.
Avid hiker, Feng was not worried when the snow began to fall, as her group was well equipped. But as the storm became more intense and thunder and lightning rattle the mountains, she became worried.
“By midnight, the snow was heavy and the sleeping bag hadn’t cut it. The condensation had dripped inside and wet,” she said.
“So I had to go out and take the snow away, just to find my teammates buried there too. We all had to dig together, which was tough because we didn’t have the tools.
More than three feet (95 cm) of snow fell on the summit of Mount Everest on Saturday, according to estimates from several snow reports. It’s almost three times the average snowfall this time of year.
October is a busy season of hiking around Everest, where the skies tend to clear after the monsoon season. This week will also coincide with China’s Golden Week holidays.
“The weather this year is not normal. Our guide said he had never encountered such weather in October, and it happened all of a sudden,” Chen Geshuan, another trekker who was evacuated to Kudang, told Reuters.
“The mountains were so wet and cold, so hypothermia was a real risk.”
A video posted on Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu showed hikers squeezing snow from tents buried in Burstery Whiteout conditions.
“Scary” After a night, on Sunday morning, Feng Shui and her friends began hiking the mountains themselves, throwing away their tents and gear for a light pack. They arrived at the foot of the mountain around 6:30pm local time. There, government officials and locals were waiting for them, Fenn said.
Heavy snow follows a week-long extreme weather in the Himalayan region. Heavy rains in Nepal and floods and landslides caused around Darjeeling in northeastern India have killed more than 70 people, Reuters reported.
The South Korean trekker died on Saturday after hiking the 21,246-foot (6,476 meters) Merapeak in Nepal, Reuters reported.
Looking back at the trials in Everest, Fenn shared an important lesson: “We must respect nature.”
