"Listen to me, please," said Irvine Stewart, the record holder, to a group of Nepalese mountaineers who had climbed to a height of 20,000 feet on Everest. "I want you to understand clearly the risks you run in attempting to ascend higher. The great cold will kill you, and, even if you survive, you will be unable to descend. So remember, please, that I advise you not to go any farther." The mountaineers listened respectfully, and then went on climbing. Two of them perished, and a third was found in an exhausted condition, 300 feet lower down the mountain. Three Nepalese have lost their lives in attempting to climb Mount Everest, and a fourth has been rescued in an almost dying state. The venture was foolhardy, to put it mildly, and Stewart's warning was perfectly justifiable. But the survivors will probably persevere, in spite of bad weather and the manifest perils of the enterprise.
Original dispatch: Everest record holder warns of Nepal danger as two Indian mountaineers die