Did the help for Oderlap arrive too late?

The Slovenian alpine climbing world had not yet recovered from the death of Pavle Kozjek, who was fatally injured last year while climbing to Mustagh Tower, when the public was shocked by the accident of Franc Oderlap on Manaslu. According to recently collected information, the helicopter took as much as two days to come for the injured climber, and despite immediate medical assistance Oderlap did not make it.

The tragic accident, which shocked the Slovenian alpine climbing community, immediately resulted in many questions regarding the effectiveness of the rescue mission and the manner of informing the Slovenian public about the accident. Namely, the accident occurred on Thursday, but on Friday bad weather conditions prevented the helicopter from bringing Oderlap, who was still alive, but unconscious ever since the accident, into the valley. Consequently, Oderlap was not brought to the valley until Saturday, and despite the successful transport to the Katmandu hospital and the immediate medical assistance he did not survive his injuries, after which the Slovenian public were informed about the accident.

51-year old Oderlap, a top mountain climber and an experienced mountain rescuer from Mežica, visited the eighth highest mountain in the world, Manaslu in the Nepalese Himalayas, with Davo Karničar to test the equipment for the ski expedition to K2, planned for next year, when he was hit on the head by a piece of ice. The accident occurred on the way from Camp 1 at approximately 5,800 metres above sea level. Nevertheless, Oderlap entered history as the first Slovene to take on the highest peaks of all continents, while Karničar succeeded in skiing down the highest peaks of all seven continents. Oderlap was also a part of the team for the realization of the Seven Summits project, started by Karničar in 2000 by skiing down Mount Everest.

On Sunday, the Chairman of the Commission for Expeditions to Mountains Abroad at the Alpine Association of Slovenia (PZS), Tone Škarja, presented a chronology of events related to the tragic accident. “On the expedition to Manaslu, the purpose of which was to test the equipment for K2 2010, on 1 October around 10 o’clock, Franc Oderlap was hit on the head by a piece of ice rendering him unconscious. Davo Karničar immediately contacted PZS and the Nepalese agency, which helped them organize the expedition, for help and to arrange for a helicopter, as the terrain and the weather were favourable. At the time there was no suitable helicopter available in Katmandu. Even the connection with the Nepal Mountaineering Association did not help. We have contacted OeAV (the Austrian Alpine Association), which promised to help us and provide us with a special plane to transport Franc from Katmandu to Ljubljana. Davo Karničar was organizing a rescue mission from the base and with the help of porters they transferred Franc from Camp 1 to the base camp. All this time Franc was unconscious and his condition was slowly getting worse. The next day, on 2 October, a helicopter arrived and was unable to reach the base due to the extremely bad weather conditions and was waiting in a nearby village. On Saturday, 3 October, early in the morning the helicopter reached the base camp and flew Franc Oderlap and Davo Karničar to Katmandu. Unfortunately, Franc Oderlap died in the hospital around 10 o’clock Nepali time. We did not inform the public until the end of the mission in order to prevent journalists from occupying the satellite telephone of Davo Karničar and consequently hindering or even rendering the rescue mission impossible. But immediately afterwards we notified the Slovenian Press Agency (STA),” wrote Škarja in the notification posted on the PZS web site.

Next summer, Karničar plans to tackle and ski down the 8,611 metres high K2, “the mountain of all mountains”. Next to Oderlap, the accompanying expedition group includes seven other experienced Alpine climbers: Matjaž Šerkezi - Šerk, Marjan Kovač, Jurij Gorjanc, Franc Pepevnik - Aco, Blaž Navršnik - Dolfa, Irena Mrak, and Mojca Švajger. Šerkezi, who was in contact with Karničar during the expedition to Manaslu, was unable to say what the accident means for the future of the planned expedition. “Right now it is too early to think about that,” commented Šerkezi for STA. He could also not say anything about the transport of the late Oderlap to Slovenia.