Base Camp CONFIDENTIAL (Cont.)

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Outside Magazine April 2001

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True EVEREST
Base Camp CONFIDENTIAL (Cont.)

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, crime increased at 17,500 feet. Often it took the form of small-time thievery, requiring locks on many tent-door zippers, but there were some brutal assaults.

STACY ALLISON: [In 1988] we actually had to kick a Sherpa out of Base Camp. He had become very difficult. And he got very mad at the Korean leader, pulled a knife on him. We had to restrain him, tie him up. Isn't that awful? We weren't sure what he was going to do if we let him go. Ultimately, he was escorted down off Base Camp.

HEIDI HOWKINS: Violence is not unusual. Some people say it's because climbers' personalities tend to be deviant. I don't think it's just that. I think it's also because the process of acclimatization, of generating red blood cells, is very hormonal. And it primarily involves estrogen, right, which is the thing that upsets women's attitudes and psychology every month. I always approach Base Camp with the attitude: OK, here's 300 men who have PMS and really don't know what's going on. And then it all makes sense.

TODD BURLESON: One year these Russians were in camp, and everybody seemed to be climbing illegally. One of the cooks got really mad about that and he picked up a huge boulder and smacked it on top of the leader's head. And so he's laying there unconscious, and this guy is about to finish him off when Pete [Athans] jumped him from behind and tied him up. The Russians wanted justice for this attack, they wanted to send him to jail. But we came in with our own version of high-altitude justice. We decided that the punishment for climbing illegally was getting smacked in the head with a rock.

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