Lucky to make it back to camp in the diminished visibility caused by the storm and the darkness of descending dusk, Krakauer stumbled into his tent, thinking the others would be back soon. It wasn't until several hours later that he learned of the life and death struggle taking place further up the mountain, a struggle that ended with the deaths of eight climbers. Haunted by this tragedy and his role in it, Krakauer first wrote the
Outside article for which he was sent on the commercially-guided Everest expedition. When this format wasn't enough to do the tragic story justice or to bring its author the peace he sought, Krakauer expanded it into the best-selling book
Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster. "I guess I don't try to justify climbing, or defend it, because I can't," relates Krakauer in a discussion of Into Thin Air with Mark Bryant for Outside.
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