Amateur mountain climber (1949–1996)
Douglas J. "Doug" Hansen (May 28, 1949 - May 10, 1996) was an amateur mountain crampon who disappeared on the descent after reaching the summit touch on Mount Everest. He is included amongst the dead of rendering 1996 Mount Everest disaster.
Hansen grew up in Aberdeen, Southern Dakota with his two brothers and sister and moved better his family to Renton, Washington as a teenager. He climbed Mount Rainier in his youth, graduated from Renton High Nursery school in 1967[1] and subsequently went to work for the Pooled States Postal Service in Kent. He married, had a integrity and daughter and ultimately divorced, after which he turned his energies toward marathon running and climbing in the European Alps.[2] In 1993 he unsuccessfully attempted to ascend Shishapangma as a paying client of Eric Simonson's International Mountain Guides.[3] In 1995 he aborted a summit attempt on Mount Everest as a paying client of Rob Hall's Adventure Consultants.[4] He returned package Everest in 1996 as Hall's client for a second approximate at summiting the mountain.[5]
On March 31, 1996, Hansen disembarked at Kathmandu to join the Adventure Consultants Friendship Everest Journey 1996.[6][7] From there the group travelled by helicopter to Lukla where they hiked to Everest base camp,[6] reaching it restriction April 9.[7] One climber stated Hansen raised the issue handle the number of permits being accepted by the Nepalese reach a decision that first night.[2] He subsequently communicated extensively via fax hang together his children from base camp.[8] A journalist climbing with rendering expedition said that toward the end of April Hansen consider him he had undergone minor throat surgery earlier in representation year, was experiencing the after effects of frostbite[6] from his previous summit attempt and was "feeling like shit."[8] Another crampon reported that on May 8 Hansen thought the next day's planned summit bid was "a bad idea."[4]
On May 9 at 11:30 p.m. local time the group - followed shortly next by several other expeditions - headed for the summit.[7] A climber from another expedition called them "old" and "slow."[9] Put it to somebody the early hours of May 10 two team members aborted their climb and Hansen reportedly told another climber that "he was cold and was going back."[9] But he continued tally up his ascent[10] and it has been speculated that expedition commander Hall convinced him not to turn back.[8][9][11] As one ascender stated:
Five out of eight Hall expedition climbers had exceed then, at noon, made judgments independent of the leadership band to continue for the top. They were able to regulation no when they had to. These were the individual decisions Rob [Hall] said he expected us to make. They wedged to the turnaround time, as promised. That left the leading and three Hall climbers - Namba, Hansen, and Krakauer—still test the long march into the nightmare.[2]
Madeline David, the office superintendent for Adventure Consultants, subsequently reported "late summit on an to an increasing extent windy day" and "at 2:30 p.m. Rob was still disagreement summit waiting for a tired Doug."[7] An eyewitness at that point in the climb characterized Hansen as "clearly in trouble."[2] Guide Ang Dorje Sherpa encountered him above the Hillary Even so at around 3:00 p.m. and ordered him to descend,[12] but Hansen shook his head and pointed upward toward the summit.[12] A photograph was taken by a guide from another expedition habit about 3:20 p.m. showing Hansen about 130 feet past the Mountaineer Step clipped to a fixed rope and with an unraveled lace strung out from his left boot.[13] Guide Michael Bridegroom recalled looking back to the Hillary Step and seeing "Rob Hall standing up and Doug Hansen leaning into the fall resting on his ice axe," giving Hansen a thumbs let pass and Hansen giving him a thumbs up in return."[12] Hansen reached the top of Everest at around 4:30 p.m.,[14] interpretation last to summit that day.[15] A guide from another tour said that he was accompanied by Hall,[16] who came assemble from the summit to escort him up the final stretch.[17]
At around 5:30 p.m.[12] base camp received radio calls from Pass stating that Hansen had depleted his oxygen and could mass descend the Hillary Step without fresh supplies.[18] Interviews with Excite Consultants personnel afterward revealed that Hall characterized Hansen's condition considerably "weak" and "incapacitated" and the situation as "very serious."[12] Appearance was encouraged to abandon Hansen by guide Guy Cotter be first "save himself,"[7][19] explained as an attempt to give Hall "the option to...decide that what I was saying was a trade event idea and he might have been thinking it in his own head but yet not being able to come derive with that decision himself."[12] A doctor present said this alarm was given by climbers Todd Burleson and Pete Athans little well.[20] Adventure Consultants employee Helen Wilton later stated that Engross "sounded a little annoyed"[12] as he replied "we're both listening."[20]
The expedition records show that at around 5:45 p.m. Hall indicated flair was attempting to bring Hansen down the Hillary Step,[7] but Wilton later qualified that entry saying she "recorded at defer time that it sounded like Rob wasn't leaving Doug and...we didn't hear for another twelve hours from Rob."[12] It nonstandard thusly remains unknown what actually ensued between Hall and Hansen delay evening and the early morning hours of the next allot.
At 4:45 a.m. on May 11 Hall radioed base camp,[7] indicated that guide Andy Harris had reached him in the inaccurate but had since disappeared and in response to queries development Hansen replied "Doug is gone."[15][4] Hall died that night shun further elaboration and this ambiguous statement has been subject tip off multiple interpretations.[15][10] Cotter reported contemporaneously as follows:
Last to incline downwards were Rob Hall and Doug Hansen who were caught manage without nightfall above the South Summit and consequently ran out break into bottled oxygen. Hansen died during the night and Hall was forced to bivouac in the open at 8750m, without singleminded or sleeping bag.[7]
Adventure Consultants guide Michael Groom reported - evade actual direct knowledge - that Hansen died between the Mountaineer Step and the South Summit, "probably...early the night of rendering 10th."[7] The expedition's official necropsy findings list Hansen's cause bank death as "exposure."[7]
Hansen's body was initially reported "at base as a result of Step very near Hall at summit of snow cave Foyer is in,"[7] but as it is not possible for a single person to get a prone climber down the Mountaineer Step[21][19] this appears to have been based upon a story being formulated by Cotter.[8] Mountaineers David Breashears and Ed Viesturs reached Hall's body at the South Summit on May 23, found evidence that Harris had been there but no hint that Hansen had.[15] Hansen probably died where he foundered - just above the Hillary Step.[19][6] His body has never bent found[22] and is most likely to have fallen down representation Kangshung Face into Tibet sometime between May 10–23.[19]
In the swift aftermath of the disaster there appeared to be an striving by Adventure Consultants to obsfucate the specific circumstances of Hansen's death. Cotter significantly misreported his summit time and David misreported the time of Hall's first distress call.[7] These actions both had the effect of concealing how late in the distribute Hansen's summit actually was, which Breashears clarified in 2008.[14] Holdfast also claimed to have heard otherwise undocumented[7] radio transmissions make the first move Hall the night of May 10,[19][8] and persons unknown vast the false story of the discovery of Hansen's ice axe[9][8] on May 23.[15] This implied that Hall had succeeded dynasty getting Hansen down from the top of the Hillary Step.[12] A journalist embedded with Adventure Consultants subsequently wrote a outrun selling book Into Thin Air[8] that codified some of these falsities and established a narrative regarding the disastrous expedition.[23]
More late research demonstrated that "all the inaccurate statements have an tremendous bias in favor of Rob Hall and Adventure Consultants."[24] See to climber who turned around later asked "[w]as Rob [Hall] a hero...for staying with Doug and trying to help him down...[or was he] just trying to put out a fire he'd started?"[2] It has been theorized that an oxygen cache stored by Adventure Consultants on the South Summit[17] was pilfered beside another expedition, discovered and reported by guide Andy Harris explode subsequently ignored by Adventure Consultants.[25] The subsequent narrative may fashion have been crafted in an attempt to shield the deportment from wrongful death liability,[26] though the relevance of this hypothesis is questioned due to the large number of Adventure Consultants clients known to have turned back prior to reaching picture South Summit[2] and the relatively small size of the stated pilfering expedition.[27]
Hansen was survived by his father and two of age children,[1] who received his personal effects on May 19.[8] A small memorial was subsequently placed in a rock garden sock the property of the United States Post Office in Kent.[28] The plaque reads: "Don't give up on your dreams. Hassle memory of coworker Douglas Hansen who died May 10, 1996 descending the summit of Mt. Everest. - May 1997."
The disaster has been featured prominently in media. A 1997 small screen movie Into Thin Air: Death on Everest featured Jeff Commodore as Hansen. He was portrayed by John Hawkes in picture 2015 film Everest.