First Amerian on Everest will revisit feat nearly 40 years later

Contact: Kay Roybal, k_roybal@lanl.gov, (505) 665-0582

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LOS ALAMOS, N.M., Jan. 5, 2001 -- In 1963, Dr. Thomas Hornbein was a member of the first American expedition to climb Mt. Everest, whose summit is the highest point on earth. For the past 30 years, he has been a professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine in Seattle.

Hornbein will describe how his Everest experience has shaped his life and career at a Director's Colloquium Tuesday at 1:10 p.m. at Los Alamos National Laboratory's main auditorium.

The talk, entitled "Lessons from On High: Cherishing Uncertainty," will be open to the public. This talk is dedicated to the memory of George Irvin Bell, another giant in the annuls of American climbing and a renowned Los Alamos scientist and senior fellow.

"Looking back more than half a lifetime ago to that event and its connection to my subsequent life as physician, teacher and researcher, I have come to realize that risk, and its partner uncertainty, are more than a seasoning to life, rather an essential ingredient to the many faces of our creativity as individuals and members of society," he said.

At 29,000 feet above sea level, Everest is close to the limit of where an acclimatized human can function. With the barometric pressure about a third of that at sea level, physical movement and mental function are substantially slowed. Hornbein will discuss the physiology of the human body at high altitude.

When Hornbein climbed Mt. Everest, the feat was much less common than it is now. Hornbein theorizes that the human need for risk has led to many of the changes that have taken place in subsequent expeditions, both in the methods used and in the people who have made the climb. Hornbein and a few others in his expedition expressed that need by attempting what was then a new route, up Everest's West Ridge.

"I feel fortunate to have been born when I was to to have climbed on Everest when it could still be a far-out adventure," he said. "As has been so for all attractive mountains, the relationship between Everest and us humans has matured to a time when many major routes to the summit have been ascended. The need by mountaineers for uncertainty has made style an important ingredient, skiers and snowboarders are descending from its summit, and those less experienced are being helped to the top by professional guides."

Hornbein holds a joint appointment in the Department of Anesthesiology and the Department of Physiology and Biophysics at the University of Washington School of Medicine. He is a research affiliate at the school's Primate Center, and is on the editorial board for the Journal of Applied Physiology.

Hornbein will deliver a second lecture "Everest Every Now and Then" for the general public on Tuesday evening at 5:30 p.m. at the Duane Smith Auditorium at Los Alamos High School. This will be a story of his adventures aimed at kids and families.

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