Witness To Catastrophe

"I was standing outside my dining tent about to have lunch when the ground started to rumble. Within seconds, it felt as though I was surfing on the normally rock-solid glacier floor. I immediately knew this was an earthquake, having experienced one here in Nepal in 2011.""
"We regularly hear avalanches here at base camp, but this one was in a category of its own."
"I witnessed what appeared to b e a 200 - 300 foot tidal wave of snow heading straight toward us and the rest of base camp. I dove into the dining tent with a few of the Sherpa staff and we waited for the avalanche to pass."
"I peered outside at the 30-second mark and all that could be seen was dense white snow. All I could think about was the rest of base camp who didn't have shelter. It was incredibly loud, thunderous rockfall combined with the power and sound of extremely high winds above 200 m.p.h."
"Our expedition leader's tent was ripped to shreds, electronics were scattered ten feet in every direction."
"At first, I decided to do my job. I filmed the events that were unfolding before my eyes. Climbers and Sherpas being carried on stretchers. Injured women and men bring assisted who suffered head traumas."
"It was completely destroyed [centre of base camp]. Tents shredded. Boots, packs, poles, water bottles, electronics, scattered and shredded. Debris everywhere. It was a war zone."
"It was hard to believe this was happening and unfolding before my eyes. Blood on the snow. Dozens of Western climbers shouting orders, trying to co-ordinate rescue efforts."
Ottawa filmmaker Elia Saikaly

ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Helicopters were diverted from other points in a Nepal devastated by the 7.8-magnitude earthquake, and its almost equally shocking after-quake that struck on Sunday, the result of which Nepal has lost over five thousand people and counting, with many more thousands injured, and awaiting evacuation from isolated villages. In contrast, about 170 mountaineers were stranded on the slopes of Mount Everest. Eighteen people lost their lives on the mountain and many more were injured, requiring immediate evacuation.

Ottawa filmmaker Elia Saikaly was there for a distinct purpose; to shoot pictures for a director at Under Armour, planning to summit six eight-thousand-metre summits in the space of a year. When the avalanche struck, Mr. Saikaly understood this was an event like none other. The massive avalanche off Pumori, a 23,000-foot peak adjacent to Everest, situated directly above the camp, inundated base camp, itself at 17,598 feet up the mountain slope.

It took but a minute, sixty seconds, for violent mayhem to take 18 lives on the mountain. The avalanche was the mountain's response to the earthquake that has taken over five thousand lives in Nepal, as well as being felt, and taking lives elsewhere, in India, and in Tibet. Even Pakistan felt the tremblor. So, once the avalanche had settled, that camera was kept rolling. The scene he found before him, was "surreal".

Helicopters began evacuating the severely wounded, while those who were killed were wrapped in tarps, awaiting evacuation.

ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

"My heart is also with the injured, both Western and Sherpa, and, of course, the thousands in Kathmandu who are suffering at this time", said the young Canadian adventurer/filmmaker.