Into Thin Air: Chapter 15–Epilogue

by Jon Krakauer
In this memoir, Jon Krakauer recounts a disastrous expedition to the summit of Mt. Everest that left five people dead and many others — including the author — questioning their own culpability.

Here are links to our lists for the book: Chapters 1–2, Chapters 3–5, Chapters 6–9, Chapters 10–14, Chapter 15–Epilogue
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. profligate
    recklessly wasteful
    Although he possessed extraordinary reserves of energy, he’d been profligate with those reserves, and by the time he got to Camp Four they were nearly depleted.
  2. jocular
    characterized by jokes and good humor
    “Hey, Martin,” Fischer bantered through his oxygen mask, trying to affect a jocular tone. “Do you think you can summit Mount Everest?”
  3. deleterious
    harmful to living things
    “Dex,” as it is known, can temporarily negate the deleterious effects of altitude; following the instructions of Dr. Ingrid Hunt, each member of Fischer’s team carried a preprepared syringe of the drug in a plastic toothbrush case inside his or her down suit, where it wouldn’t freeze, for emergencies.
  4. incapacitated
    lacking in or deprived of strength or power
    Chuldum and Arita — Sherpas on Hall’s team who hadn’t accompanied the summit party and were waiting in reserve at Camp Four specifically for such an emergency — had been incapacitated with carbon monoxide poisoning from cooking in a poorly ventilated tent; Chuldum was actually vomiting blood.
  5. hector
    talk to or treat someone in a bossy or bullying way
    After Beidleman and the others had set out from the huddle to get help, Madsen had gathered together the climbers who remained and hectored everybody to keep moving in order to stay warm.
  6. importune
    beg persistently and urgently
    “Rob, this is Helen at Base Camp,” Wilton importuned, sounding as if she was on the brink of tears. “You think about that little baby of yours. You’re going to see its face in a couple of months, so keep on going.”
  7. incessantly
    without interruption
    Throughout the day on May 11, his friends and teammates incessantly begged him to make an effort to come down under his own power.
  8. triage
    sorting and allocating aid on the basis of need
    Hutchison decided that Lhakpa was right — there was only one choice, however difficult: let nature take its inevitable course with Beck and Yasuko, and save the group’s resources for those who could actually be helped. It was a classic act of triage.
  9. rancor
    a feeling of deep and bitter anger and ill-will
    Without rancor, three such groups — Todd Burleson’s Alpine Ascents International expedition, David Breashears’s IMAX expedition, and Mal Duff's commercial expedition — immediately postponed their own summit plans in order to assist the stricken climbers.
  10. fecundity
    the quality of something that causes healthy growth
    Breathing thick marine air that carried the scent of a minus tide, I marveled at the fecundity of the Seattle spring, appreciating its damp, mossy charms as never before.
  11. culpability
    a state of guilt
    Stewing over my culpability, I put off calling Andy Harris’s partner, Fiona McPherson, and Rob Hall’s wife, Jan Arnold, for such a long time that they finally phoned me from New Zealand.
  12. censorious
    harshly critical or expressing censure
    A compulsively methodical man, he had elaborate systems in place that were supposed to prevent such a catastrophe. So what happened? How can it be explained, not only to the loved ones left behind, but to a censorious public?
  13. hubris
    overbearing pride or presumption
    Hubris probably had something to do with it. Hall had become so adept at running climbers of all abilities up and down Everest that he got a little cocky, perhaps.
  14. corollary
    occurring at the same time, along with, or as a consequence
    And a no gas regulation would have the corollary benefit of automatically reducing trash and crowding because considerably fewer people would attempt Everest if they knew supplemental oxygen was not an option.
  15. respite
    an interruption in the intensity or amount of something
    Not even in sleep is there respite: imagery from the climb and its aftermath continues to permeate my dreams.
Created on Sat Jul 15 08:54:46 EDT 2023 (updated Wed Jul 02 16:14:19 EDT 2025)

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