An avalanche did, to save me.
In the shadow of the world's highest peak, a man the world had already buried found his way back to the living. Dawa Sherpa, a cook pressed into service as a guide, fell eight meters into a crevasse on Everest's Khumbu icefall on May 28 and survived seven days alone on biscuits and ice before an avalanche, of all things, became his salvation. His emergence near Base Camp on June 4 — crawling, frostbitten, and unrescued — reminds us that the mountain does not distinguish between the prepared and the forgotten, and that survival sometimes depends less on systems than on the stubborn refusal of the body to yield.
- A man with no summit experience, depleted oxygen, and a 28-kilogram pack slipped from a ladder over a crevasse and fell into smooth-walled ice with a fractured leg and no way out.
- For seven days, his family in Kathmandu performed Buddhist last rites while he licked ice chunks and listened to a helicopter pass overhead without seeing him.
- His satellite phone never worked, his walkie-talkie batteries died, and despite an alarm raised by his expedition company, no search team ever reached him.
- An avalanche — the mountain's own violence — filled the crevasse with snow and gave him the slope he needed to crawl free, one crampon-grip at a time.
- A waste-cleanup crew, not a rescue team, found him near Base Camp, igniting fury across the mountaineering community and triggering a government investigation into the failure of Everest's safety and rescue protocols.
Dawa Sherpa's family in Kathmandu had already begun mourning him. Monks were chanting last rites. His wife and daughter, devout Buddhists, were grieving in the way their faith prescribed. But Sherpa was alive — trapped eight meters down in a crevasse on Mount Everest, eating frozen chocolate and breaking ice to wet his mouth.
It had begun on May 28. Sherpa, a cook who had been pressed into service as a substitute guide despite never having summited Everest, was descending from 8,400 meters when his oxygen ran out. He told the British climber he was with to keep going, then spent the night alone at Camp Three before pushing toward Base Camp the following day. Crossing the Khumbu icefall — a fractured, crevasse-riddled glacier — while carrying a 28-kilogram bag, he slipped from a ladder and fell. His head struck ice. His leg fractured. The walls around him were smooth. There was no way up.
He survived on biscuits and dried coffee, melting ice in his mouth for water. On June 3, he heard a helicopter overhead but could not see it, and it could not see him. Then an avalanche filled the crevasse with snow, and he spent an hour clawing his way up the new slope on crampons until he crawled free. He followed a rope down the mountain on his hands and knees.
On the morning of June 4, a Nepali waste-cleanup crew found him near Base Camp — not a rescue team, but sanitation workers. He had been alone on the mountain for a full week. His satellite phone had never functioned. His walkie-talkie batteries had long since died. An alarm had been raised, but no search effort had reached him.
Doctors in Kathmandu treated him for frostbite, severe dehydration, and a fractured thigh bone. His family stopped mourning. The mountaineering community erupted in anger. The government launched an investigation into the rescue failures. When asked whether he would climb again, Sherpa said no — he would trek, perhaps, but the mountains as a workplace were behind him. He had survived the unsurvivable, and he knew the cost.
Dawa Sherpa was already dead, as far as his family knew. Back in Kathmandu, monks had begun chanting the last rites. His wife and daughter, both devout Buddhists, were mourning him in the way their faith prescribed. But Sherpa was not dead. He was trapped seven hundred meters below them, wedged in an ice crevasse on Mount Everest, eating frozen chocolate and licking chunks of ice to stay alive.
It started on May 28, when Sherpa—also called Hillary, after the legendary climber—descended from the Balcony at 8,400 meters with three other climbers. He was working as a cook for a small expedition company called Himalayan Traverse Adventure, but they had pressed him into service as a substitute guide despite his never having summited Everest. His oxygen ran out around 7,900 meters. He told the British climber Chris Thrall to keep going without him, that he would follow. But when the oxygen was gone, his hands and feet stopped responding. He sat at the rope for thirty minutes, unable to move.
Somehow he made it to a tent at Camp Three, where he boiled water and made porridge. He spent the night there while the wind howled outside. The next day he pushed down to Camp Two, but by then everyone else had already descended. He was alone again. He decided to make for Base Camp in a single push, crossing the Khumbu icefall—the fractured, collapsing head of a glacier where crevasses open without warning. He was still carrying a 28-kilogram bag stuffed with eight empty oxygen cylinders and a client's sleeping bags. On a ladder spanning one of those crevasses, he slipped. He hung there for a long time, his hands burning, before finally letting go of the bag. Then he let go of the ladder.
He fell eight meters into smooth-walled ice. His head struck something. His leg fractured. He was alone in the dark, eight meters down, with no way to climb out. He dug into his jacket and found biscuits, chocolate, and dried coffee. He had no hot water, so he broke ice and wet his mouth with it. A helicopter passed overhead on June 3—he could hear it but not see it. He spent two nights in the crevasse wondering if he would live or die, hoping someone would come. No one did. Then an avalanche thundered down and filled the crevasse with snow, creating a slope he could climb. It took him an hour, gripping ice and latching his crampons into whatever purchase he could find, but he crawled out.
He found a rope and followed it down the mountain, crawling. On the morning of June 4, a team from the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee—a Nepali group that maintains routes and cleans waste—found him near Base Camp. He had been alone on the mountain for an entire week, not the six days initially reported. His satellite phone had never worked. His walkie-talkie batteries had died. The expedition company had raised an alarm, but search and rescue efforts were delayed. No one found him until he found his own way down.
In Kathmandu, doctors treated him for frostbite, severe dehydration, and a fractured thigh bone. His family stopped mourning. The mountaineering community erupted in anger over the failure to locate him sooner. The government launched an investigation. When asked if he would climb again, Sherpa said no. His time in the mountains was finished. He would trek, perhaps, but never climb for work again. He had survived the unsurvivable, but the cost was clear: he would not return to the place that nearly killed him.
Notable Quotes
I am very happy to be back. I thought I would die there.— Dawa Sherpa
I will not go to the mountains now, maybe just for some trekking.— Dawa Sherpa
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
When you say the avalanche saved him—that's not metaphorical, is it? It actually created the only way out?
No, it's literal. The crevasse had smooth walls he couldn't grip. He was trapped. Then snow from above filled it in, giving him a slope to climb. Without it, he would have stayed there.
And no one was looking for him at that point?
A helicopter had passed over. But he was too deep to see or signal. The expedition company knew he was missing, but search efforts were delayed. By the time anyone was actively looking, he'd already escaped on his own.
What strikes you most about what he did down there?
That he kept moving. He was exhausted, injured, alone, with almost nothing to eat. Most people would have given up. He didn't.
His family thought he was dead.
They were performing death rituals while he was crawling down the mountain. That's the gap—between what they believed and what was actually happening.
Will he ever go back?
He said no. His working life in the mountains is over. You survive something like that, and the mountains lose their hold on you.