Wilco alive at the K2 after terrible accident

august 3 2008

The Mount Everest and the K2 are the most mayestic and most dangerous mountains in the world.

A friend of me went with an expedition that was terrible and fascinating. All survived, and we really felt grateful about that.

This weekend an international expedition got in problems at the K2.
An icerock, part af an avalanche, hit the ropes and cut them through, at a height of 2000 metres.

2 climbers were recovered....dead...
9 were missing.

Yesterday almost a whole family was burried in my country. They died at a relatively easy mountain in Europe, after one of them lost grip and fell, pulling the others on the rope into death too.

So we thought that we had to burry another climber: Wilco van Rooijen.

In 1995 he was caught by a rock and was severly wounded, and it felt like the mountains just finished what was his fate.

I couldn't believe it.
It didn't feel like he was dead. But I'm not Char or Lisa.

This morning it was reported in the news that another 2 bodies were recovered and that Wilco van Rooijen was found alive.
He's been able to save himself. His feet are froozen.

Right now we're waiting for more news.
More men are still missing.
The rescue helicopters can't reach that height, so t'll take quite a long time.

K2 is the second largest mountain of the earth.
It's extremely dangerous.
280 climbers have reached the top, 66 have died.
And I'm afraid we have to add more this weekend.


Update

Wilco and another member of the team finally arrived at the camp at sunday evening.
They have serious freezing symptoms.
The effect of being about 60 hours in the deathzone are not yet clear.

One member of the team is still missing. An irish man.

From all the teams that were on the mountain when the ice started to move, 7 have been confirmed dead already.