Forever on the Mountain by James M. Tabor

On the other side of the globe, legendary Ukrainian explorer Alexander Klimchouk Stone s polar opposite in temperament and style, but every bit his equal in scientific expertise, physical bravery, and sheer determination has targeted Krubera, a freezing nightmare of a supercave in the Republic of Georgia, where underground dangers are compounded by the horrors of separatist war in this former Soviet republic. Bold, heroic American Bill Stone is committed to the vast Cheve Cave, located in southern Mexico and deadly even by supercave standards. In 2004, two great scientist explorers are attempting to find the bottom of the world. This is the story of the men and women who risked everything to find it, earning their place in history beside the likes of Peary, Amundsen, Hillary, and Armstrong. And yet as late as 2000, the earth’s deepest cave the supercave remained undiscovered.

The deepest cave on earth was a prize that had remained unclaimed for centuries, long after every other ultimate discovery had been made: both poles by 1912, Everest in 1958, the Challenger Deep in 1961. What results is the first full account of the tragedy that ended a golden age in mountaineering. He consults not only mountaineers but also experts in disciplines including meteorology, forensics, and psychology. Tabor draws on previously untapped sources: personal interviews with survivors and those involved in the aftermath, unpublished diaries and letters, and government documents. Reckoning by lives lost, it was history’s third worst mountaineering disaster when it occurred but elements of finger pointing, incompetence, and cover up make this disaster unlike any other. This book begins as a classic tale of men against nature, gambling and losing on one of the world’s starkest and stormiest peaks. And, for reasons that have remained cloudy, there was no proper official investigation of the catastrophe. Ten days passed with no rescue attempt, while more than half an expedition was stranded and dying at 20,000 feet during a vicious Arctic storm. In July 1967, seven young men members of Joe Wilcox’s twelve man expedition died on Mt.

Forever on the Mountain by James M. Tabor