Wow at about 3.30am there was a noise like a train going past and I woke up with a start. I knew it was an ice collapse/avalanche but it sounded really close by and my next thought was that although this is a great location, we are first in the firing line. I listened out for zippers, ready to get out of my tent fast but there appeared to be no movement from anyone else so I settled down again. I thought if that’s the noise of an ice collapse in the middle of the Khumbu god knows what the noise for like when the avalanche hit base camp in 2015. That must have been horrific to hear and petrifying. The strange thing is that all the people killed in that avalanche weren’t killed by the snow and debris smothering them, they were killed by the wind clouds that came with it. The amount of snow that came down created a massive wind that got faster and faster as it raced through the moraine building up speed until it picked climbers up and hurled them against rock and ice at about 200mph.
So today is a rest day. We organise our climbing gear. I go for a walk around base camp (or part of it) and build a snowman. Or should it be snowperson these days. We just read, eat, lie around and nap. It’s far too hot in the tents during the day so we utilise the dining tent which is larger and more open. It’s cool inside it.