What Happened On Everest In 1996

One of the most important qualities that an elite climber must have is leadership. The elite climbers and guides must be able to meet a number of new people that are strangers to each other and build some sense of a team. Krakauer does not have a strong background in leading groups or building comradery, which is key for a climb like Everest. Krakauer says himself, “In climbing, having confidence in your partners is no small concern” (40). He also mentions how the actions of one climber can “affect the welfare of the entire team” (40). The type of group he climbed with on

Mount Everest is 29,092 feet tall. Imagine climbing this mountain with little to no experience. Would you survive? In the nonfiction novel Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, Krakauer and his recruited crews try climbing this mountain. With many deaths along the way to the top, readers are quick to blame characters in the book. However, character stands out from the rest: Krakauer. In the book Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, Krakauer is the most responsible for the other character’s deaths because he recruited and dragged along inexperienced mountain climbers, pushed them harder than they should’ve been pushed, and watched them suffer.

In order to continue climbing Everest, many aspects of climbing need to be improved before more people endanger their lives to try and reach the roof of the world. The guides have some areas that need the most reform. During the ascension of Everest the guides made a plethora mistakes that seemed insignificant but only aided in disaster. The guides first mistake is allowing “any bloody idiot [with enough determination] up” Everest (Krakauer 153). By allowing “any bloody idiot” with no climbing experience to try and climb the most challenging mountain in the world, the guides are almost inviting trouble. Having inexperienced climbers decreases the trust a climbing team has in one another, causing an individual approach to climbing the mountain and more reliance on the guides. While this approach appears fine, this fault is seen in addition to another in Scott Fischer’s expedition Mountain Madness. Due to the carefree manner in which the expedition was run, “clients [moved] up and down the mountain independently during the acclimation period, [Fischer] had to make a number of hurried, unplanned excursions between Base Camp and the upper camps when several clients experienced problems and needed to be escorted down,” (154). Two problems present in the Mountain Madness expedition were seen before the summit push: the allowance of inexperienced climbers and an unplanned climbing regime. A third problem that aided disaster was the difference in opinion in regards to the responsibilities of a guide on Everest. One guide “went down alone many hours ahead of the clients” and went “without supplemental oxygen” (318). These three major issues: allowing anyone up the mountain, not having a plan to climb Everest and differences in opinion. All contributed to the disaster on Everest in

On the third day of the first Everest simulation, new information was given to each member. As the environmentalist, I was given the weather forecast chart which I have to analysis with the marathoner as to predict whether there was going to be a frost bite on the next day, deciding whether to proceed or remain at the camp. However, due to the lack of time and discussions, I did not tell others that I obtained such information. I did not notice until the second simulation that such information was critically important, without the weather chart our team could not decide whether to proceed or remain at camp. This demonstrates the lack of communication between team

To begin with, the fact that the mountain decides everyone's fate is a constant mantra reiterated throughout both the book and the movie. The book says “You can never tell who the mountain will allow and who it will not” personifying the mountain the same way the mountain was personified in the movie. The movie also says “the mountain always gets the last word” once again personifying the mountain. What these quotes truly mean is that not everyone will make it up the mountain, it does not matter what kind of shape you are in. Some of the fittest people do not make it up or do make it up, but do not make it back down. In both the movie and the book, you will notice that the weather is never what the forecast actually says it's going to be, the mountain makes its own

And they got one climber off, and they crashed attempting to rescue the second man” (Helicopter Rescues Increasing on Everest 7). It is a rescuer’s job to know the risks for saving a climber but if the climber is a professional, they shouldn’t be easily be making mistakes. When there are rescuers who come pick you up fast when you can’t complete the climb, it is like having a safety net behind you. But where is the safety net behind the rescuers? There isn’t one, once they make a mistake, there won’t be someone to save them, so there shouldn’t be rescuers saving climbers when they are risking their own lives but also the

Success in the Mount Everest Simulation was not defined as reaching the summit of a mountain, but rather in terms of strong leadership, positive team work, logical decision making, and effective communication and dispute resolution to accomplish a specific task. Based on my personal experience, I realize the importance of knowing and understanding all team members. Fluid, open communication and positive feedback are key factors. Active listening, motivating, engaging, and valuing each team member’s contributions create an effective work environment. Mistakes happen, but valuable learning comes from the mistakes and our understanding of the challenges and opportunities to overcome them. If we, as team members, learn from our mistakes and are fully committed to the success of the team, we all

1. Relying on the book chapter for perception and decision making, describe the role of the perception biases, “shortcuts”, and errors that the climbers — as individuals and as a group— made during the 1996 expedition to Mount Everest. Describe at least 5. How these biases, “shortcuts,” and errors did contribute to the tragedy?

Leadership failure is rarely discussed, and yet often represents the greatest potential risk to an organization or group in an unfamiliar situation. For the Everest Simulation, I held the role of team leader, in which I was required to achieve goals relating to a combined ascent and maintaining team safety. At completion, 13 of 20 individual goals, and 65% of overall team goals were accomplished. The lower rate of success was due to several ethical and leadership related failures, resulting in a team member being evacuated on the final ascent. Although the simulation could have been more successful, the team dynamics witnessed were enlightening as to what constitutes effective leadership and ethical decision making in a high-intensity situation.

Mount Everest, as the highest mountain in the world, is famous for the enormous challenge of reaching its summit. This analytic essay is an analysis of the management involved with the Everest Simulation created by Harvard Business School. During this 3hour simulation I was the team doctor and achieved all ten of the possible ten points available, therefore 100% of goals were achieved. This score is related to the goals I accomplish as an individual and as a team. I enjoyed the simulation and expanded upon my knowledge as it taught a profound understanding of team dynamics, the capability to accept change, a stronger ability to analyse available information and create effective communication. Our team as a whole obtained 94% of our goals.

The Everest simulation was a unique experience. Before the actual simulation started, my team discussed the approach we would take and how we will deal with situations wherein the personal goals collided with the team goals. We shared our character profile information with each other and began the exercise with excitement and a firm resolve to do our best.

The Everest simulation allows participants to explore varying forms of communication, leadership and different attributes of teams to determine what alternative best suit the given situation. The simulation entails decision making processes, which must be effectively executed in order to maximise team efficiency and attain set goals. The simulation involves ascending towards the summit of Mount Everest along with other team members, each with predefined roles. The interdependent nature of the task requires members to work in collaboration to achieve goals and later evaluate the outcome and the shortcomings that may have hindered success. This report explores communication, leadership and groups and teams as themes for examining the outcomes of the task, as well as determining what implications this experience holds for future teamwork based activities.

Lack of psychological safety within the team members failed to fix cognitive bias of irrationality. If members developed trust within the team, cognitive bias could have been prevented or at least minimized. The truth that climbers might make irrational decisions and find it hard to turn back when they are so closed to the summit was obvious, but teammates seeing this problem did not speak up since they did not feel that their thoughts were welcome and felt uneasy. More cognitive biases could also been prevented to lessen the complex system of the expedition. Since climbing Mt. Everest is already a high risk venture, any additional problems such as irrational decisions can cause a crisis. Using the early sign of issues with Hall’s team’s progress, it was obvious that the probability of failing the expedition was high before the team even started. Hall could have used the issues as a sign of the complex systems that exist, and could have used this knowledge to prevent any irrational decisions. The complex systems and the lack of psychological safety also contributed to the tragedy. The team members failed to communicate and trust each other, which then added more problems to the complex systems. For instance, Boukreev’s could have spoken up to his team leader, Fischer, about his concerns regarding his team members lacking experience to begin with. By speaking up, he could have prevented more chain reaction due to lack of communications and feedback within the

In the wake of the 1996 disasters, a doctor decided to perform an experiment that required him to follow a team of hikers to measure for the first time, the toll high-altitude climbing takes on the heart, lungs, blood, and brain. I thought it appropriate to incorporate some of the evidence acquired from the studies done by the group, seeing as the interest for this experiment was triggered by the tragic events that had materialized on Mount Everest May of 1996. The program is a first scientific study I have seen on what occurs in human body when it is steadily experiencing this type of stress. The program shows what happens to the awareness and physical ability in low oxygen pressure. While superficially seeming to be normal, under intense testing done by the researchers, it is clear that there stands weakening in the hiker’s brain capacity to process information.

Weathers knew that the Everest tragedy would leave a permanent mark on his life but continues to stay optimistic. He even began a second career as an inspirational public speaker and has become somewhat of a celebrity. Weathers still dreams about Everest sometimes, but surprisingly they're not nightmares. He says they were the enjoyable moments before the storm had occurred and that they were never painful or fearful. "I never dream about Everest in a bad way," he says. "I loved being there." (Rottenberg 2015). He hasn't regretted a single thing he's done and says that he got so much more out of it than he gave up.