By Ross MacDonald
Childhood dreams of being a fireman, astronaut or jet pilot are standard
kiddy fare, but George Tumpach had a different vision when he was a leetle
nipperskovich in 1950s Czechoslovakia. He wanted to climb the seven
highest mountains in the world.
A forward leap by several decades brings us to the present, 28 years after Tumpach escaped to the West and only a few months after his return from an attempt to scale Mount Everest. The Everest trip was part of what has become the Global Seven Summits Expedition, an organization he conceived to fulfill his childhood dream.
What separates Tumpach's expeditions from so many others is that he has absolutely embraced the latest in communications science, which resulted in the strenuous cartage of "more than 150 lb. [67.5 kg] of satellite and computer technology" on the backs of his six-man team.
Those interested in such adventures might already be familiar with Tumpach's
efforts through his Web site (http://www.sevensum
mits.com) because a large part of the exercise was to send daily satellite
photographic feeds of the team's progress directly to the Web site, as well
as to various publications and Discovery TV. The expedition was also filmed
in digital video, to be televised upon their return.
"I wanted the climb to be different from what everybody else does and decided to use only the latest telecommunications and digital technology to be able to communicate through email and to transmit photographs," Tumpach explains.
"A year and a half ago I didn't even know what a computer looks like." However, by the time the Everest project ended in mid-October, Tumpach had learned plenty about computers. He had also been turned back from attempts on both the north face and the south face due to extreme weather conditions-the worst he had seen in a dozen years.
"We were originally going to climb from the north but the weather stopped us and my Sherpa told me that the south is always better," Tumpach says. "But the weather was just as bad there too. That makes me the first climber ever to attempt to scale Everest from both sides in one season. But now I have to go back because I still haven't reached the summit. In fact, I'm supposed to be there right now but there are other expeditions there waiting who still can't climb because of the weather."
Tumpach's party of four Sherpas, himself and a professional cinematographer did make it to Camp-1, at an elevation of 6,500 m. But even during this partial climb they accumulated 600 digital photos, 8,000 35mm slides and 45 hours of digital video. The slides were taken because the digital image quality wasn't high enough for projection onto a large screen and Tumpach is forever touring the world presenting illustrated talks and lectures about his on-going project.
The two digital cameras used on this expedition were Kodak DC-50s which, though provided as part of a sponsorship deal by the manufacturer, were solicited by Tumpach after another adventurous fellow told him he "never had any problems with it freezing or anything else."
Tumpach says he wouldn't use anything else, "because another beautiful aspect of these cameras is that it was relatively quick to send the pictures to the satellite. We could have gone for a much more expensive camera with a much higher resolution but then the file sizes would have been way too big to transmit to the satellite in the time we had."
As it was, the average JPEG file for each photo was about 100 to 140KB and took eight to 12 minutes to transmit through one of the expedition's two Imersat M telephones up to the satellite link. The 3.6 kg (8 lb.) Imersat M satellite telephone system looks like a portable computer, but instead of a lid containing the screen, there is a dish antenna.
The only technological problem Tumpach encountered was losing the satellite link while a long transmission of digital photographs was in progress. Finding the geostationary satellite and establishing a link was apparently easy, taking less than 10 seconds. But the signal had to travel from Everest to the satellite, from the satellite to Perth, Australia, then along many ground lines and numerous microwave switches before eventually ending up in Calgary, where Tumpach's Web server is located. This complex system collapsed and disconnected many times-usually after about seven minutes-forcing them to transmit the same data each time.
Digital durability
Tumpach says he loves his Kodak DC-50s because they presented absolutely no problem in the extremes of heat and cold that characterize an Everest assault. "We had problems with both of our Nikon 35 mm cameras at Katmandu and in the Annapurna region because of the extreme humidity, but our digitals kept going," he says.
"The digital camera is also good because in extremely dusty conditions you don't have to worry about the film getting scratched. You've got to keep it clean and protected, of course, but particles don't scratch the film because there isn't any."
The Kodak DC-50 stores about 26 high-definition pictures on one 4 MB PC Card memory card. Tumpach had four cards in total.
The memory cards were "emptied" into the expedition's three NEC Versa 6050 notebooks, then transmitted through a satellite link at the end of each day.
"The NECs were the only computers that didn't collapse," he says. "Panasonic and Hewlett-Packard computers that others were using just didn't last. In fact, there was a Spanish expedition at the base on the north side [one of eight parties that arrived there at the same time], which ended up borrowing one of my Versas because their computer had given out."
Tumpach adds that these apparently ill-equipped Spaniards ended up borrowing one of his DC-50s too because the digital photos they were sending to the newspapers back home were of poor image quality. "When good pictures started showing up, the newspaper called them to ask what camera they were using but they didn't want to say because they didn't want to hurt their own sponsor's feelings," Tumpach laughs.
According to Tumpach, the logistics and responsibilities of arranging a climb are exactly the same as running a multinational corporation. Expedition leaders are like the chief executive officers, the supervisory staff and the labor all at the same time. The fact that it costs approximately $200,000 to conduct an Everest climb means they also have to be careful about corporate relations, which is why his Spanish peers felt compelled to demure at promoting-or even identifying-a competing sponsor's product.
In addition to the three notebook computers, two satellite phone systems, two 35 mm cameras and the two digital cameras, Tumpach's team hauled two Sony VX-1000 digital video cameras and a Sony DVCAM-537, which is a studio-quality incarnation of the VX-1000.
Anyone experienced in the portable world, even with a cell-phone, is probably asking what type of batteries such an array of wireless technology demands.
Tumpach found a nifty solution to that problem too. Members of his team all carried devices called Unisolar Blankets, which are flexible solar energy collectors that look like... well... blankets. During the daily climbing, or any other time they were outside, they would drape these blankets over their backs-and their Yaks-recharging the batteries for their devices all day. Neato!
Tumpach has reached four of the seven summits already and wants to make the record for climbing them all. It's Everest that's holding him back, though, because of weather conditions. He plans to go back, of course, but not before conquering Russia's Mount Elbrus next spring. For this adventure he will again be toting a technological burden.
"This time we'll be taking the Kodak 210 camera because it's new and my objective is to promote, pioneer and test the latest technology under these extreme conditions. I hope also to have new NEC portable computers with a Pentium II for the same reason."
In addition to his Web site, Tumpach is working on a book of his adventures, which will be appropriately called The Seven Summits: One Man's Dream, an account of fulfilling his childhood ambitions, replete with digital photos of the process.
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