Chapter 596 - 278: Rescue, Warning, and Exploring New Routes! (Part 2)

"I believe many people have seen this thing in movies or news, climbers on Mount Everest gripping this rope to climb up."

"I’m sure everyone is curious, how did this thing come about?"

"That is to say, who was the first person to climb up and place this rope?"

"The answer is—the North Slope Road Construction Team."

"Because we are now on a commercial route, as everyone knows, there are two commercial routes in total. One is the North Slope commercial route we are on now, and the other is in Nepal on the South Slope."

"And the reason why these commercial routes charge climbers such high fees, apart from providing guides and transporting supplies, is also because each climbing season, a road construction team goes up the mountain in advance to set up safe facilities."

"And this road-building process is the real mountaineering!"

"They have no protection, setting up ropes on the steep route from 6,500 meters to the summit, installing anchor points, building metal ladders, and inspecting for avalanches and ice crevasses."

"This is a task that needs to be done every year."

"Because ice crevasses, glaciers, and heavy snow are all dynamic. After a climb one year, maybe even before the next year, the previous ropes will be buried by wind and snow, and the erected metal ladders will become deformed and unstable."

"And those ice crevasse and avalanche risk points will change as well."

"So in a sense, the pioneers of these road construction teams are the more valuable Everest climbing warriors. It is they who make it possible for subsequent climbers to reach the summit, turning the chasms into thoroughfares."

"Without these road construction teams, the death rate on the North Slope would be even higher!"

As Li Younan was explaining to his live audience, he smoothly passed through the Wind Gap, with the C2 camp just ahead.

Before officially reaching the C2 camp, they still had to traverse a long slope, covered with thick snow.

Once they crossed this snow slope, they would reach the C2 camp, at an altitude of 7,900 meters.

Generally speaking, climbers choose to rest at C2 camp for a night before moving on to the next camp.

However, although they had passed the Wind Gap, it did not mean there was no wind here, just that it was much weaker compared to the Wind Gap. At this moment, they could still feel the strong wind carrying snow grains and ice crystals beating against their goggles.

Li Younan took a slight breath, determined to reach the next critical point no matter what.

But just then, he suddenly felt a strange tightness in his heart, followed by a sense of dread emanating from his chest.

He abruptly realized that the snow beneath his feet suddenly felt heavy, not with the usual firmness, but as if stepping on shifting sand.

First, a slight vibration traveled from his feet up his legs, and then Li Younan quickly raised his head, hearing a low, frictional sound—not a loud noise, but the rustling sound of snow layers compressing, becoming denser and denser.

Avalanche!

The word immediately popped into his head.

Members of the climbing team ahead started shouting in panic: "Avalanche! Avalanche!"

Then their mouths were covered by guides wearing matching outfits.

Li Younan instantly understood; the ones shouting were commercial climbers who went blank with panic in such situations. The guide did it to prevent triggering a larger avalanche.

After all, those frequently buried by avalanches know that the vibrations from sound waves can cause an even bigger one.

Li Younan quickly turned around, his thick backpack absorbing part of the impact, pushing him forward with a force.

The surrounding snow began to move, not in whole slabs sliding down, but in his view, a vast white wave of snow with fine ice particles surged down the slope.

Looking back, a member of the closest climbing team was just about to shout something, but the noise was drowned out by the sound of snow.

The rope suddenly jerked him; he let out a pained cry, and the next moment he was released—the knot had broken.

Li Younan was then carried by the snow wave, sliding forward, with his knees buried in the snow.

Yet even so, Li Younan remained very calm inside.

His mountaineering skills endowed him with a strong ability to predict disasters. Before the avalanche struck, his brain had already instantly judged that this snow slope, even if an avalanche occurred, given his position, wouldn’t be particularly dangerous if handled properly.

Avalanches vary in size.

After sliding for about ten meters, the snow began to slow down. Li Younan propped himself up with his ice axe, standing, his knees submerged in snow up to more than half, struggling a bit to pull his legs out of the snow.

Looking back, he saw the previously laid rope along the slope was now broken into segments, many buried under the snow, and previous footprints vanished. The anchor points of the rope were mostly pulled out, tilted in the snow, and the previously clear path was now entirely chaotic.

The climbing team ahead faced more difficulties. Their physical strength wasn’t as good as Li Younan’s, nor did they have his foresight.

During the avalanche, Li Younan, reacting quickly, used his backpack to reduce the majority of the impact, so the avalanche did not cause him physical harm.

But for the rest of the climbing team, it was different; most of their bodies were buried in the snow.

It’s important to know the speed’s impact force in an avalanche is comparable to a truck falling off a cliff, but this is not the primary lethal mechanism of an avalanche.