February 12, 2012, Sunday. Camp 3 is established, but …

On 9th February in the afternoon Adam Bielecki, Janusz Gołąb and Ali Sadpara established camp 3 at 7,040 m above sea level. They passed the Japanese Couloir without any problems. Having put up a tent, they prepared for bivouac in the conditions complying with the weather forecast, i.e. wind blowing with 45 km/h, temperature -35°C and almost no cloudiness. The next day the weather was supposed to be similar with one exception – the wind speed was to increase (up to 60 km/h). Unfortunately, reality turned out to differ from the weather forecasts. At night the wind blew with approx. 80 km/h and sometimes up to 100 km/h. The clouds appeared and a snowstorm started. The night in camp 3 was very difficult for Adam, Janusz and Ali. Adam, who slept at the windward side, felt as if the wind was about to blow him away together with his carrimat. There was no doubt that in the morning the team had to descend as fast as possible. Securing the tent before the descent was quite a task. The guys placed some stones on the tent and started to go down in very difficult conditions.

Below, in camp 2 Artur Hajzer and Shaheen Baig awaited the team. They spent equally difficult night at the pass, where wind threatened to blow away their tent. At the pass the wind speed was increasing both in the morning and during the day. Artur worried about his friends’ descent and the way down to the base camp. Hajzer contacted Agnieszka Bielecka (in the base camp) and asker her for immediate telephone contact with Karl Gabl (supporting the expedition with weather forecasts). The problem was that Karl lived in Austria and according to the local time it was 4 AM there. Artur wanted Karl to provide him with revised weather forecast and information concerning the next couple of hours as well as whether an increasing wind was a kind of unexpected disaster or not.

In the meantime, Adam Bielecki, descending from camp 3 as the last one, raised the leader’s blood pressure by telling via radio that he lost feeling in all his extremities and had problems with going down (the base camp had radio contact only with camp 2 and heard nothing from camp 3).

Meanwhile, in the base camp after discussion over weather forecast graphs of Swiss Meteo Test the council decided that there was no point in waking up Karl Gabl in Austria; it was the last day to descend, weather conditions were deteriorating and were supposed to get even worse and persist till at least 15th February. Such information was transmitted to camp 2 with emphasis put on fast descend. (New weather forecast received from Gabl at approx. 1:00 PM local time confirmed that on 10th February the wind blew with 80 km/h at 7,000 m above sea level and not with 60 km/h that had been announced earlier.)

After approx. two hours the tense crisis situation receded. The entire 3-persons team reached camp 2 at approx. 10:00 AM. They were cold and tired, but hot drinks and food were already awaiting them. After one hour of rest, at approx. 11:30 AM all of them started to descend. In camp 1 the wind was weaker. They spent a night there. The next day, i.e. on 11th February, in the afternoon the team reached the base camp. The descent from camp 1 to the base camp was accompanied by medium wind and moderate snowstorm.

Adam after a difficult descent to camp 2

In the base camp Ali Sadpara was diagnosed with second-degree frostbites of toes. Janusz Gołąb suffered from first-degree frostbites of the left cheek. Adam experienced mild frostnip in his feet and a finger in his right hand; moreover, he slightly burnt his toe (result of warming up his feet over a stove).

Good weather conditions for the period of 7th-10th February were right in 90%. During the last day the cloudiness and wind parameters were higher than the ones indicated by weather forecasts. It resulted in a 3-hour nervous situation and a fight with real winter in Karakoram. Currently, we already know what to expect when something does not go according to the plan. In the meantime, we are glad that both the route and us are ready for the summit attempt. We have already been 4 times on the mountain, established three camps and we consider the acclimatization process finished.

Morale of the team is good and we are hoping for the best. Keep your fingers crossed and think about us WARMLY.

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Agna, Adam, Artur, Janusz