After the Wind: 1996 Everest Tragedy - One Survivor's Story, by Lou Kasischke
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After the Wind: 1996 Everest Tragedy - One Survivor's Story, by Lou Kasischke
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Near the top of Mount Everest, on 10 May 1996, eight climbers died. It was the worst tragedy in the mountain's history. Lou Kasischke was there. Now he tells the harrowing story of what went wrong, as it has never been told before - including why the climbers were desperately late and out of time. His personal story, captured in the title AFTER THE WIND, tells about the intense moments near the top. These moments also revealed the love story that saved his life. In the spring of 1996, Lou Kasischke joined renowned climber Rob Hall's Mount Everest expedition. When he said goodbye to his wife, Sandy, he knew he faced major physical and mental challenges against rock, snow, ice, avalanches, and extreme high altitude to climb the highest mountain in the world. What Lou didn't know was that he also stood at the threshold of a living hell. Six weeks later near the top, things went wrong. Lou and his fellow climbers faced a challenge even greater than the mountain - the internal struggle about what to do when you are close but out of time. There were no second chances. Decisions were made. Some lived. Some died. It was the worst tragedy in Mount Everest history. Lou wrote his account of the events 16 years ago in the aftermath of the tragedy, but only now is he ready to let it go. He tells two stories. One is about the historic events. His perspective and analysis about what happened and what went wrong have never been told, and his account differs markedly from what others have written. The truth in the story depends on who is telling it. Lou also tells a very personal story about how he came back home. An inspiring story about where to go for inner strength when facing a tough decision. A story about his wife Sandy's part in his survival. A story about what he heard, after the wind - the voice of the heart. A love story. Awards for After the Wind Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Books of the Year GOLD MEDAL: Benjamin Franklin Book Award: Best New Voice in Nonfiction BRONZE MEDAL: Foreword Reviews Book of the Year Award: Adventure WINNER: New York Book Festival: Memoir WINNER: National Indie Excellence Book Award: Adventure and Memoir BRONZE MEDAL: Independent Publisher Book Award: Sports WINNER: The Eric Hoffer Award for Independent Books: Memoir WINNER: Shelf Unbound Best Independently Published Book WINNER: Pete Delohery Award for Best Sports Book
After the Wind: 1996 Everest Tragedy - One Survivor's Story, by Lou Kasischke - Amazon Sales Rank: #48010 in eBooks
- Published on: 2015-10-25
- Released on: 2015-10-25
- Format: Kindle eBook
After the Wind: 1996 Everest Tragedy - One Survivor's Story, by Lou Kasischke Review "A vivid, intimate memoir that with great clarity and attention to detail, tells an unforgettable survival story." -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review)"After The Wind is a thoughtful, well written love story of Kasischke's dedication to his wife and anchor Sandy and his passion for climbing." -- BlueInk Reviews (starred review) "A through analysis of the 1996 Everest disaster... and the best preparation for my Everest assent." -- Jean Pavillard, IFMGA Swiss Mountain Guide"Kasischke's account provides an eye-opening look at the perils and extreme conditions on Everest. Evocative illustrations by Jane Cardinal further enhance the text, and includes maps and time lines." -- Publishers Weekly"Kasischke chronicles the events not only to recover some truth from the sensationalism surrounding that fateful day, but also to share a deeply personal story of the enduring power of love. ... Kasischke attributes his survival to the promises he made to 'live a story he can tell,' and 'come back home' .... After The Wind is decidedly genuine in the construction ... and Kasischke presents his story humbly as one man's experience of a horrific day" -- New Orleans Review"This riveting book examines what went wrong before and during the expedition ... including a series of ill-advised decisions just below the summit .... Kasischke also examines what holds true when all else fails, when survival is no longer likely. He offers a fascinatingly personal look at what he believes saved him. Ultimately, this is a survival story about love --of mountaineering, of God, and of the deep and abiding bond between a husband and wife." -- The US Review of Books
From the Inside Flap Near the top of Mount Everest, on 10 May 1996, eight climbers died. It was the worst tragedy in the mountain's history. Lou Kasischke was there. Now he tells the harrowing story of what went wrong, as it has never been told before - including why the climbers were desperately late and out of time. His personal story, captured in the title AFTER THE WIND, tells about the intense moments near the top. These moments also revealed the love story that saved his life.
In the spring of 1996, Lou Kasischke joined renowned climber Rob Hall's Mount Everest expedition. When he said goodbye to his wife, Sandy, he knew he faced major physical and mental challenges against rock, snow, ice, avalanches, and extreme high altitude to climb the highest mountain in the world.
What Lou didn't know was that he also stood at the threshold of a living hell. Six weeks later near the top, things went wrong. Lou and his fellow climbers faced a challenge even greater than the mountain - the internal struggle about what to do when you are close but out of time. There were no second chances. Decisions were made. Some lived. Some died. It was the worst tragedy in Mount Everest history.
Lou wrote his account of the events 16 years ago in the aftermath of the tragedy, but only now is he ready to let it go. He tells two stories. One is about the historic events. His perspective and analysis about what happened and what went wrong have never been told, and his account differs markedly from what others have written. The truth in the story depends on who is telling it.
About the Author Lou Kasischke is retired and lives with his wife, Sandy, in northern Michigan. He remains active with alpine sports and other endurance challenges in the great outdoors.
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Most helpful customer reviews
46 of 49 people found the following review helpful. The personal love story transcends the expedition narrative... By Pete Olson While Lou Kasischke's "After the Wind" clearly acknowledges the tradition of narratives written in the wake of major climbing feats (Maurice Herzog's "Annapurna," David Roberts' "Moments of Doubt," and more recently Jon Krakauer's "Into Thin Air" or Anatoli Boukreev's "The Climb" the latter two both produced within months of the same events described here), Kasischke ultimately transcends the expedition narrative form altogether. Kasischke allowed nearly 18 years to "settle" his thinking about the events on Mount Everest in May of 1996; he applies his considerable skills in both mountaineering and risk assessment to help understand how a series of faulty decisions led to such disastrous consequences even as he leads the reader deeply into his own personal narrative of a gently sophisticated love, not for a mountain or a set of skills, but for his dedicated and understanding, though deeply skeptical, wife.These expedition narratives often employ a subtle passive construction either to emphasize the climbers' frailty in the face of the mountain's power, or to diminish responsibility for decisions with poor outcomes. Kasischke carefully documents the facts that led him to select Rob Hall as his expedition leader; chief among those facts was Hall's apparent ability to make good decisions about route finding, group safety, and weather, even under the pressure of proximity to the summit, clients' expectations, and his own need to build a business of leading paying clients to summit prizes. The only time this familiar passivity emerges in "After the Wind," Kasischke uses it to describe his and others' curious inability to recognize initially the poor decisions leaders were making in continuing up the mountain long after the prescribed turn-around time. In short, Kasischke and several others realized in time that they needed to turn back (just 300 vertical feet from the summit) and they survived; others who decided not to turn back perished.But the wind itself is also an active character here; it is the force that continually buffets the climbers, sucking warmth from them and, with the diminished oxygen of high altitude, addles their thinking. "After" the wind then certainly refers to a time just after Kasischke decided to turn around: the point of relative stillness when he has freed himself from the "storm" of desire and determination pulling him to the summit. But as the epigraph from 1 Kings clearly states, "After the wind, a still small voice," this is the key to Kasischke's transcendance of the expedition narrative form. Other climbers have certainly included moments of mystical thinking in their narratives (Roberts, Messner), but Kasischke presents the "still small voice" that stops him from continuing up the mountain as the voice of his wife, Sandy, reminding him of his promise to "come home." This fact is presented without an ounce of sentimentality, just as the rest of Kasischke's narrative offers clear, precise language introducing climbers and non-climbers alike to the intricacies of a challenge as big as Everest. The inclusion of this "still small voice" gently, simply cuts through the will, desire, and determination of a life lived in pursuit of a dream that vanishes in the clear recognition of a far more important truth: the power of love."After the Wind" then refers not just to the time immediately after Kasischke decided to turn back, the moment of recognition of this greater goal, but also to the time it has taken him to reflect after the storm of controversy surrounding the events of May 1996. Most expedition narratives employ challenges on the mountain as metaphors for challenges in the life of the climber: for Kasischke, the wind is, of course metaphorical, just as in 1 Kings, but the wind is also, crucially, the force that hurls climbers to their deaths; the still small voice is no metaphor either: it was his wife's literal voice inside him urging him to come home. The summit really lies in northern Michigan where Kasischke makes his home.
38 of 40 people found the following review helpful. Interesting perspective on the 1996 expedition, and why things went wrong By pjf Commercial guided expeditions for risky endeavors are more common than ever. So it is interesting and useful to have a rational account presented of the decision making of this survivor, and so far as he can relay it, by Rob Hall, as to why this expedition went so wrong. If you ever join an expedition with similar life threatening risks, it might be useful to you.Some of what might have been motivating Hall is information I had not read before. What motivated the author was love, responsibility, and a desire to return alive and whole to family -- when he could clearly see this expedition was taking the level of risk to an unimaginable level.But why was it raised to that level? I've never understood why Hall continued to guide his group so late, when he knew if they went to summit they were going to run out of oxygen before they returned to the oxygen cache. Apart from the issues of daylight, weather, relative strength, etc, the logistics of oxygen, for those using it, were incompatible with success with that timetable. Hall had to know it, particularly for Hansen - who'd had a problem crashing in the previous year. Hearing Mr. Kasischke relate his problems with his oxygen system, added to complaints from others, made me wonder if that gear was flawed. A bad oxygen system would contribute to the poor decision making.Kasischke relates his own psychology of why he climbs, why he chose the Hall group, his disappointment when Hall made decisions counter to the reasoning he chose him in the first place, and when and why he broke with Hall's leadership when he determined it was fatally flawed. I think all these are useful for anyone who might need to make similar decisions in the future. Even if survival is not part of the end result - we all have to choose who to follow, why, when to follow, and when to leave.In terms of content, this narrative is heavy on philosophy and less heavy on daily details of the expedition, personalities and color. That doesn't mean it isn't there, because it is. But that's only half the tale, the rest is philosophy. And Mr. Kasischke is discreet. Having been rudely surprised himself when Krakauer's ratings of his teammates appeared in an Outside Online web interview - something the members of the team didn't expect to have discussed or reported on -- Kasischke is careful to respect his teammate's privacy. As a reader, I respect that too, but I confess I had less of an immediate feel of the places and people at times, due to that. Still, the last chapter, where he goes into some of what he suspects was Hall's reasoning for the summit attempt was fascinating and something I had never read elsewhere.This book also gave a great sense of the truly frigid experiences of high camp after the summit attempt, how pinned down everyone was by the storm and how difficult survival was even for those who made it back to camp. I can completely understand why, having survived this, the author chose to hang up his crapons after this expedition. I am glad, though, that he didn't hang up his pen, and that we have this account.All in all, if you are interested in Himalaya expeditions, Everest, or just this particular expedition, this is a book that you have to purchase.
32 of 35 people found the following review helpful. A remarkable eye-opener and real page-turner By G. Marks I have known the author for about 30 years, and worked very closely with him early in my career. I watched with interest as he immersed himself in all things concerning mountain climbing and other challenging endurance activities. One office joke was “where in the world is Lou climbing mountains this week?” I’ve never seen someone immerse himself so quickly and thoroughly into a discipline as Lou did when it came to conquering the rocky and snowbound heights. In both work and play he was very analytical and methodical in evaluating the pros and cons of important issues, while bringing a very practical viewpoint and a high level of common sense to each endeavor. Since I had already learned a great deal about the 1996 Everest tragedy from several articles, books, documentaries and movies on the topic, I was skeptical about whether there was anything new that Lou could add to understanding the unfortunate chain of events leading up to this historic calamity. However, I could not have been more wrong. In reading Lou’s detailed account (it took me only 3 evenings, as I couldn’t put it down), I saw the same careful analysis and plodding evaluation of relevant factors that he typically brought to bear on the many business deals that we worked on together. His first-hand and candid account of certain decisions made and risks taken by other climbers (including expedition leaders) is startling. He also thoughtfully reevaluates several critical events leading to the tragedy, and introduces some eye-opening considerations and personal viewpoints about its causes and how it might have been avoided. In doing all of this, Lou achieves the same level of sincerity, honesty and “plain speak” that he has always been known to apply to any subject. I was also very moved (I have to admit, to tears) by Lou’s very sincere account of his feelings and affection for his wife, Sandy, and how his devotion to their relationship, and their special and enduring love for each other, led him to make the right decision when a wrong decision would almost certainly have added him to the list of climbers who didn’t return from the mountain. Lou did make the right decision, fortunately --- just a few hundred yards from the summit --- a decision which saved his life and made it possible for him to return to Sandy and tell the compelling and moving story of why he survived and, unfortunately, why others did not.
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After the Wind: 1996 Everest Tragedy - One Survivor's Story, by Lou Kasischke
After the Wind: 1996 Everest Tragedy - One Survivor's Story, by Lou Kasischke
