Ungrateful Socialite Endangers Climbers on Deadly Mount Everest Excursion | Sandy Hill Case Analysis 

Some people climb mountains to see the world, some people climb mountains so the world can see them...

Her life is saved by 2 men and she says afterwards: "Which 2 men is that?" Wow.

I can't believe she said "There were no heros on the mountain, the guides were just doing what they were paid to do." 8 people lost there lives because you wanted to be seen as a professional climber without actually having to do any work to become a professional climber and they had to drag your body back to camp because you couldn't walk.

Anatoly did all of this without oxygen himself. He is a true badass.

Imagine being so self-absorbed and aloof that you dont give credit to people who physically saved your life...

These idiots have destroyed that poor mountain leaving garbage everywhere

Sounds like a complete sociopath. 3 divorces suggests she'd be a nightmare to live with too.

A skilled and diplomatic way to call this woman a raging narcissist

If my name was SANDY HILL, I wouldn't climb mountains

She couldn’t give those men credit for saving her life because then she would be admitting she didn’t conquer Everest. Someone had to literally carry her down the mountain.

She grew up being pushed easily up the social mountain by her parents and never learned to climb on her own.

Ever notice that when they publish the list of people who have summited these mountains they never include the Sherpas? Hundreds if not thousands of Sherpas have made that same summit but they never get credit. Only the rich and famous and western “mountaineers” get on that list. Some Sherpas have summited two dozen times.

“Her response was painful in many ways, including grammatically.” 🙏🏼👑

She would have had sufficient oxygen, sufficient food, and a working toilet had she remained in her living room.

I know a man,who with his best friend,walked a good portion of Antarctica. The result was two self satisfied individuals who hated each other, two books blaming each other for the problems, and two people that were so smug and overbearing that noone can stand to be around. Yep.a life affirming experience

I was a river guide years ago. I have had many people who claimed all kinds of skills. Bragging about various rivers that, in their opinions, Concorde. Yet in the thick of it when their adventure suddenly went bad. They didn’t come through, or had the necessary skills to deal with the situation. Many of them simply fell into a defeatist mindset. Literally saying “Let me die”. Fortunately, I have not lost anyone on my guided trips. Though, had too many times that, that was severely tested. But I and with the assistance of others prevailed in keeping everyone safe. But to this day, it amazes me. How easily people give up. It is the main reason that I don’t do commercials guided trips anymore.

As a Peruvian with Bolivian family. I spent a good share of time in cities at high altitudes. And what most people don’t realize is that, it doesn’t matter how good your physical shape is or how many stairs you can climb. Once you are at high elevations all bets are off . Your body and metabolism behave completely different. Some people bodies can adjust easily while others will really struggle. And there is no real way to determine which side you will fall into. All these Everest tourist are just playing chance

Scott Fischer and Rob Hall were pioneering mountain tourism. They both died, but the 1996 disaster sparked interest in this sort of tourism. Nowadays, many people have been baby-stepped up Everest; so many that the achievement of topping out has little cachet any more. Climbers in crisis are left to die, since rescuing them would put other lives at risk. People have died waiting in the queue to top out. Everest is becoming an ecological disaster while lines of unserious and incapable climbers leave oxygen bottles, feces, toilet paper, and their dead bodies on this once-beautiful mountain. It's a sad, sad mess.

A friend of mine went to climb Everest with a mountianeer colleague, which was a serious ambition of his, and got really close to the summit, but conditions weren't great and time wasn't in his favour, so he turned around, and I have immense respect for him for making a sensible decision, especially given that (as he would probably acknowledge) in his younger years he didn't exactly have the world's smallest ego. Also, I'm really grateful that he's still alive, which unfortunately, many people who made a different decision aren't.

Without intending to excuse any of Sandy Hill's failings as a climber or as a person, she was not solely or even predominantly to blame for her or her team's ultimate failures and fatalities. Scott and Rob both made choices that fateful day that lead directly to numerous critical failures, which, given their professional climbing experience and paid positions as team leaders, should have been weighed to the safety of their clients, but was instead swayed towards the viability of their climbing businesses. In particular, neither correctly determined or enforced a turnaround point once they both became aware that they had begun their respective team's climb too late, given the traffic on the mountain that day, and the rapidly deteriorating weather conditions as the climb progressed. Sandy's behaviour after the fact was reprehensible and repulsive, but it would not have become a focus outside the immediate perspective of those present, if not for the self-interested choices made by Scott and Rob, who were both competing in the lucrative market of Everest climbers. Both understood that calling off the climb on the cusp of 'success', could have a significant negative impact for both them, as the year's season was pretty much over with that final climb, because the weather would become impossible to climb through till the following year's season. So each of them were incentivised to push clients to finish successfully, and consequently tell other wealthy friends and colleagues about their experience and generate more business for the companies that guided them through. Under normal conditions, no one could begrudge their motivations, but on Everest, anything that is prioritised before personal safety can quickly become a fatal flaw in reasoning, as this catastrophe clearly demonstrates.

The experienced mountain guide who short-roped Sandy Hill was indeed "a Sherpa": his name was Lopsang Jangbu Sherpa. The day before, he'd climbed with 35kg on his back for about 1000m, into the "death zone." This load included Sandy Hill's Iridium sat phone for NBC. Lopsang was also the Sherpa who tried to save both groups's leaders, Fischer and Hall, albeit unsuccessfully. He was killed by an avalanche on Lhotse that September.

What incredible strength that guy Anatoli had to go back up twice and rescue two people is amazing at that altitude.

It pains me that there are entire businesses charging huge sums to corporate egos with little experience or ability but want to be seen to be having an adventurous lifestyle. They endanger professional climbers and sherpas. It seems they all have mountainous egos which are never scaled. These people never give a damn who else they endanger or impact or hurt, as long as they are seen to achieve. Humility is a dish unpalatable to the egocentric.

Hubris and greed - a deadly combination.

This case makes me glad that my hobby is lying in bed watching RU-vid videos. At least nobody has to come save me!

In the book about this expedition, "Into Thin Air," You'll see how Sandy Hill brought about 30 pounds of extra equipment, it was her broadcast setup so she could give daily accounts on her progress. That was lugged up the mountain by a Sherpa. In the book it also talks about how at some point, Hill, was "short-roped" up the mountain. That is a 3 foot piece of rope was tied between her and a Sherpa and the Sherpa pulled Hill up the mountain. That's just pitiful.

Excellent analysis. Sandy Hill is THE best example of how a lady with class does NOT behave.

I love this guy. He’s lowkey roasting her the whole time.

She can run up 26 flights of stairs 8 times a day??!! She should have put her energy into becoming a Fire Fighter.🧑‍🚒

Two of the biggest things that stood out for me, was her *absolute* disrespect for other people- throwing an expensive necklace down the mountain in front of really poor men is despicable, but she clearly has no regard for how they live, or how doing what they do, risking their lives in mountain-climbing season is basically their bread and butter for the rest of the year. The fact that she didn't even give credit to the men who rescued her is beyond ungrateful. It's so shallow, it blows my mind how some people live their lives...

After watching this video, I got inspired to study this story more deeply. Though Sandy Hill made a few choices that made it more difficult for the team to recover once the situation went south, she really wasn’t responsible for the disaster. It was primarily the leaders who doomed the team, mostly due to their insistence on reaching the summit despite being well behind the turn-around time. Even if Sandy Hill has been impeccable in her judgment and preparation, there still would have been multiple fatalities on that trip.

My dad is a small time narcissist and can be effectively dangerous in his ways. How much more someone like this. Narcissism kills.... other people.

Ungrateful with an undeserved sense of entitlement. She is completely oblivious as to how others perceive her. Socialite or sociopath?

Narcissists don't have the ability to stop being narcissists.

Since you brought grammar into the conversation, I want to thank you for using the word comprise correctly.

People like her will make that mountain much more colorful every single time the snow melts.

Not another one, you could do a whole series called Everest idiots

nothing is more reliable than rich people pretending purchased service amounts to personal merit. They can buy any skills or expertise they want to pretend is theirs.

The wait for ropes to be set on the Hilary Step was the biggest factor in most deaths that day.That caused a 2 hour delay to continue to the summit while standing still and using oxygen.

I appreciate that you articulated the story so clearly and offered your analysis in clear and concise language. It was refreshing to hear a RU-vidr who actually covers the content and ends the video.

*Sandy never cared about the other people who died.* To her, they were merely obstacles and burdens to be shoved off for her own survival. As is horrifically common among socialites and influencers alike, she was and is only capable of thinking about HERSELF and how she is perceived. Anatoli should have left her on the mountain and saved Yasuko instead, and Everest should have been restricted to the public after this pointless insanity. I'll always stand by that. Media was right behind her, as is to be expected. Stop makin' stupid people famous!!

It seems that Sandy was so narcissistic that she may have even viewed her rescuers negatively - as people who diminished her by making her look weak. This would explain her refusal to thank them and her odd behavior.

New to the Channel!!! First, Your ability to tell A Story is Amazing! The way You Unpack the Facts during the story are double Amazing!! Thank You for Sharing; Triple Amazing!!! 😊😊😊

Your words are VERY WELL chosen and presented.

My dad worked mountain rescue for a long time- he always shared that a Climber must be: Humble of the Mountain, respectful of natives… and to Always have a guide that worked at the area every day.

Sad fact: Anatoli Bukrejew died one year later on Annapurna while trying a winter climb. His body was never found.

4:02 the fact is climbing the other summits in The Seven Summits are no joke.

Dude. How did I just find your channel? Who ARE you and why is your disposition so awesome. And your storytelling, suburb. And your analysis, hysterical. Cheers and thanks for your channel.

Imagine having to live with knowing you saved the most rotten person off the mountain when you could have saved more deserving people. 🤮

Dangerously unqualified people, with money. God help us all

3:50 Running up stairs is hard work. But her regime of stair climbing adds up to an equivalent of about 2200 feet of climbing in a day. That’s not nothing, however, I used to run on the varsity track and cross country teams in college and I asked my coach (my coach has a masters degree in kinesiology and was a college coach for decades) about running stairs, since it is a popular training as seen in movies and TV, his response was “it gets you really good at climbing stairs”.

I've been saying for years...do some dangerous, cool stuff while you are young. That way, later in life you won't feel the need to compensate for your mis-spent youth. I don't really see an Everest summit as all that impressive now. It means you had a few hundred thousand bucks to blow.

Me: Why is it known as The Death Zone? Dr. G: Because the conditions there are inconsistent with life. Nailed it...

Yasuko Namba was also a noted mountaineer. She was the second Japanese woman to climb the seven summit. RIP to her.

Leaving aside ALL the negative comments about her after she got down from Everest her lack of empathy had nothing to do with her physical condition, many climbers run out of steam on the way down, you cant tell how your body will react until fatigue hits you. I think her previous climbing record was as good if not better than most climbers (baring guides and sherpas) on both teams. I have read so many articles recently condemning her and blaming her for for the obvious failings of the team leader that it almost seems like a witch hunt. Your own title for your video says it all.. "Ungrateful Socialite Endangers Climbers on Deadly Mount Everest Excursion " It says she's guilty before even reading your synopsis. All praise To Anatoli Bukreev and even he had to suffer the garbage from Krakauer before he was given a bravery award.

"Into Thin Air", John Krakeur. It's unfair to say Pittman was unfit to summit Everest. She had already bagged the other six major summits, and her exercise regimen was far better than many of the other pay-to-play pretenders. Everest claims lives, period. Sometimes those lives are experienced, sometimes they're very lacking.

The Mount Everest decent is far more dangerous than reaching the summit. This applies to everyone. 1. Your oxygen tanks are running low, and most people will die without supplemental oxygen. 2. You already exhausted. The physical task on your body is unlike anything else, and there is no real training for it. The Death Zone is real. It is not a marketing gimmick. 3. There is a crash of adrenaline. On the ascent, you have a specific goal, reach that summit, on the descent, that adrenaline rush is gone. That adrenaline can help push you to the top, but it is gone to get you off the mountain.

It sounds like Sandy got a free ride her entire life. Thanks to the hard work of others. Her father, her husband(s), and those people on Everest. She couldnt have afforded any of these experiences on the salary of a "columnist". Im using that term generously

Excellent, informative, and comprehensive explanation and analysis of this situation. I agree with your conclusion, and I don’t understand how Sandy could begin to take credit for completion of the climb. She quit before it was finished, and she has blood on her hands for not being fully prepared. The team leaders who gave their lives didn’t quit and no doubt realized their own mistakes and had a “if only I had…” conversation with themselves in the last minutes and seconds of their consciousness!

I remember this. Rob Hall, the other guide who died, was a New Zealander so it made the news here. Absolute heroism on the part of Anatoli, the guide who made the climb so many times to rescue Sandy and others. Tragic that so many list their lives.

Im starting to see a pattern here. Grandiose personalities love to involve themselves with Mt. Everest

Three things stood out narcissistic, self entitled, lack of empathy for others. Draw your own conclusions.

Caught on the replay this morning you were a little late for me last night lol...Thank you for the update 🙏🙏🙏

I remember reading about this year's ago. Sandy blew off her son's 8th birthday in order to join the team that was making three climb very soon.

I can't imagine. I drove a car up 14,000 ft Mt.Evans in Colorado and got altitude sickness quickly, had to descend. That's the extent of my mountain climbing😅😅

I've met quite a few people who climbed Mount Everest and all of them were great people and humble. One lady who summited years earlier was so traumatized by the ordeal that she had great difficulty even talking about it. Regardless of what the media states, it is a life or death situation, nothing that we can imagine while sitting at home in our comfy chairs can comprehend the effort.

Thank you for this presentation.

Stopped and paid homage @ the Everest Climbers Memorial on the way to EBC (Everest Base Camp) in 2019. Sobering and sad. I’ve climbed a few mountains and always remember that the summit is only half way.

"Into Thin Air" is a good read about that tragic episode on Everest written by a journalist that was there.

They don't call it Mt. Ever-rest for nothing !! 😂

There are pictures near the summit that show how crowded it can be which is absurd!

Never heard of this story but now im OBSESSED! What a tragic story💔💔

As far as narcissism goes she was ahead of her time

Some people don't realize that just the words THANK YOU....can mean so much....

I thank you very much for your great analysis. Take care.

"her response was painful in many ways, including grammatically" LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The 1996 Mt. Everest disaster was a cascade of failures, there’s so many things that went wrong that contributed to the disaster. Greed, arrogance, lack of safety, lack of common sense, you name it.

It’s very presumptuous to write a book about mountain climbing success before you accomplished it, and that’s what it sounds like she did. RIP Scott! RIP to the others as well who perished. It’s beyond what I would attempt! Anatoli was a hero that day. May he rest in peace.

Love your analisis and reasoning

I attempted to climb Aconcagua last year with a friend of mine. I trained for a year in order to do it. Climbing that mountain is like running an ultra marathon and that’s just the summit day. While we were at base camp I developed bronchitis and despite several medical interventions from the ER physicians at base camp I had to leave via helicopter. It was devastating and felt like a loss which was normal and I sucked it up knowing I would try again. My friend who is insanely competitive threw a fit when she found out the group wasn’t ascending the mountain when she thought they should (she is NOT an experienced climber) and after they missed their weather window and had got come back down, she was so determined to get to the summit that she risked her self hiring a small unknown company to take her back up. To her it wasn’t about the journey only the summit. For that she put her hands in unknown people and she did make it but her attitude and short tempered nature about things not going the way she wanted always rubbed me the wrong way as not conducive to the true spirit of mountaineering…. I’ll go back at the end of the year.

PBS's "Storm Over Everest" (in which Sandy Hill Pittman appears, and sounds very smug) is one of the most affecting documentaries I've ever seen, I watch it about once a year. It's free on RU-vid

Never trust anyone that cannot or will not say mea culpa when they err, it shows a lack of character and a total lack of self awareness.

“One more mountain she did not conquer” Ok, Mr writer. You ate with that one.

If you’re actually analyzing this, Sandy Hill was a highly skilled, very experienced extreme mountaineer, and the so-called journalist who depicted her as a spoiled socialite had an irrational contempt for her even though they only briefly met twice. Many of the mountaineers had satellite phones at base camp, but only her having one was a problem. Her cappuccino machine was just a regular 2 pound camping coffee pot like everyone else had. She put some powdered milk in her coffee and shook it, and other hikers joked about her needing her cappuccino. Krakauer somehow managed to not realize she didn’t actually have a 35 lb machine that had to be plugged in at camp 4.

I speculate that this is one hill of a situation that she won’t ever mentally conquer! She is not capable of empathy and compassion , both skills required to not only grasp the situation but to mentally process it as well! She definitely has no idea that she essentially turned the events on the mountain into a proverbial mole hill!

I struggle to understand the appeal of conquering Everest. I mean with all the guides and so forth and all the fellow climbers it seems neither particularly unique nor a good testament to one’s determination or abilities. Maybe it is just a good dinner table anecdote for the wealthy

Beck Weathers is an example of someone who was (unlike she) experienced but selfishly obsessed, unable to control his compulsion. He impossibly survived '96 climbing accident and became a motivational speaker. His conclusions and regrets at least led him to new appreciation of his family, saved his marriage and finally forced a much needed "sobriety". EVERYONE should watch extended documentaries on him and in-depth interviews, especially those after he had some time to reflect and heal post-surgery, finally able to share his fresh perspective on everything in his life.

One thing I will say is that I don't think Sandy bears any blame for the death of Scott, in all the resources I've found his death came more so from him showing signs of severe sickness throughout the climb, clearly implying he wasn't at all in fit condition to be climbing as much as he did and ultimately paid the ultimate price for his refusal to turn back.

Self-absorbed, no empathy, seeing others as expendable after achieving their needs, narcissistic - I believe these are some traits of a psychopath.

Most mountaineering deaths occur on the descent, I agree that the failed descent for Sandy negates the success.

Very good Doc. Clever as usual!!

_"Disappointment Peak"_ was the perfect name for Sandys first summit...as well as her as a person overall.

Once entitled, always entitled. It's a mindset that never goes away.

I once had an argument with someone who said a Sherpa Mountaineer had climbed Everest 6 times without oxygen and in bare feet. I highly doubted the bare-footed part of story. After watching the last few videos about Climbers on Everest. My doubts are well founded.

Moral of the story, stay FAR FAR AWAY from narcissist's, you're life depends on it.

Both Rob Hall and Scott Fischer broke their own rule regarding their set turn-back time during the climb to the summit. That was probably the most critical factor resulting in their and their clients' deaths.

I never made it to the death zone, nor the cripple zone, but I did make it to the crying in fear zone.

I like to climb KENT FALLS CT. A half mile of new wooden steps with a railing, portolets , water fountains and a great view of the huge parking lot so you can see your car when you reach the top!!!

A bit you left out is that climbing Mount Everest by the South Col route, the normal route, isn't really what most people think of as mountaineering any more: 1) There are fixed ropes for most of the route, especially in the most dangerous sections. 2) There are camps of tents already in place at regular intervals up the mountain. 3) There are large numbers of highly-skilled guides and Sherpas to assist less skilled and resilient people. So while it is true to say that Sandy Hill wasn't fit enough or competent enough to climb Mount Everest, and just paid $65,000 to make this happen, there were/are/will be loads of other affluent people just like her who have done the same thing.

Ms Hill is exceedingly fortunate that she didn't remain on Mt Everest as one of the 300+ climbers who are now permanent residents of the top of the world. I believe that she had CONSIDERABLY more responsibility for the fact that the other climbers died because the initial delays in the summit push were directly caused by the Sherpa who was supposed to place the ropes in preparation for the Hillary step and another area I cannot quite recall ATM. Unfortunately Ms Hill was occupying all his time delaying BOTH companies summit push that day. Scott, MM leader, was frustrated with this problem, which would cause the ultimately fatal delays by still being in the dead zone after they should have summited and be returning to Camp 4. Ms Hill was also literally being carried UP the mountain by another Sherpa because Scott knew just what her positive reviews of her Everest trip would do for his business, but the book she planned to write about her great victory remains unwritten until this day. I watched a fairly recent interview she did speaking about her Mt Everest experience and you could easily be forgiven into believing that all went according to plan, but people died and Ms Hill remains persona non grata in the mountain climbing community. Thanks for reading.