Chapters 18-19 Summary and Analysis

Chapter 18 is called "Walk or Crawl." With oxygen and visibility dwindling, the Mountain Madness climbers feel their way down the mountain while Boukreev nervously walked the perimeter of the camp looking for arrivals. Martin Adams arrived after struggling down from the summit and collapsed in his tent. Boukreev found him there and helped him get into his sleeping bag. He asked Adams for news of the other climbers, but Adams was too exhausted to reply.

Meanwhile, Neal Beidleman tried to lead Klev Schoening, Lene Gammelgaard, Tim Madsen, Charlotte Fox and Sandy Pittman back to Camp IV. They had reached the South Col, the wide sloping snow field where the camp was situated, but in the worsening weather could not see the camp. Also with the group were Yasuko Namba, a Japanese climber from Rob Hall's group that was having...