Chinese double amputee talks about finally climbing Everest, 43 years after first attempt
Xia Boyu had his feet amputated after suffering severe frostbite during an attempt on Everest in 1975. This year, having battled cancer, bad weather and the Nepalese government, the 69-year-old finally got to the top
Climbing the world’s highest mountain could not have been further from Xia Boyu’s mind as an athletic 25-year-old in 1974, when he played for the provincial soccer team in Qinghai, an underdeveloped region on the Tibetan Plateau in northwestern China.
But when the Chinese Mountaineering Association announced it was looking for climbers to join an upcoming expedition, Xia put in an application – though only for the opportunity to get a free health check-up.
To Xia’s surprise, he was among the handful of successful candidates from a field of several hundred applicants.
“I didn’t realise the significance of it. I thought I’d go back to playing football afterwards,” Xia, now 69, recalls.
After just a few months of training, Xia and his fellow climbers embarked on an ascent of the 8,848-metre (29,029-foot) mountain in January 1975. The mission failed; worse, Xia suffered such severe frostbite that he later lost both feet.
The experience set Xia on a 43-year mission to reach the mountain’s summit, which the double amputee finally achieved this year, overcoming enormous odds in the process.