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Ardito Desio Part 3: Antarctica and the Everest Pyramid
Oct 10, 2004 12: 26 EST
Ardito the climber, the explorer, the professor, lived his life to the fullest. He squeezed every drop out of it until the very last moment, and always described himself "a happy man." He died at home, at age 104. The final part of our K2 features series on the life of this remarkable explorer, and 1954 K2 expedition leader.
Last we recalled Ardito’s greatest climbing achievement; as the leader of the expedition that put Lino Ladecelli and Achille Compagnoni on the first summit of K2.
At their arrival back in Italy, the K2 conquerors were received as heroes; Ardito became a living legend. At 57 years of age, this could have been the perfect time to slow down. But instead of spending time attending banquets, he was already dreaming of new travels and a new expedition project: The South Pole.
Antarctica: A crossing? Climb Vinson?
Desio’s initial Antarctica plans were ambitious: He intended to traverse the Continent from the Weddell Sea to the Ross Sea, through the Geographic South Pole. But the plan was not as original as he had thought. In 1955, La Stampa published a story about a British and New Zealand expedition with the same aim. Instead of getting in a race, Ardito simply forgot about the traverse.
Yet not about the frozen continent. Desio had a hard time to raise funds for an Antarctic expedition. In 1961 at last, he got the money. The aim now was to climb the Vinson Massif. But the air supply support for the team screwed up, and the expedition was aborted again.
Ardito finally made it to Antarctica, if not as a proper explorer, at least as a scientist. On November 1962 he was invited by the US National Science Foundation to the American Polar stations in Antarctica, and he actually became the first Italian on the South Geographic Pole. Only he got there by plane, not on skis.
From Burma to Tibet
Desio was lucky enough to travel the world in very exciting times. Frontiers were changing, and so was the world. He visited the troubled Afghanistan, the occupied Tibet, Burma (currently Myanmar), and so forth… The gates of the world were wide open to the famous geologist, who directed researches, gave lectures and received medals and tributes wherever he went.
Desio’s Everest Pyramid
In 1987 Gorge Wallerstein from Washington University announced that K2, and not Everest was the highest mountain on Earth. Desio ran to check it out! He launched two Everest measurement expeditions, 1987 and 1992, led by Agostino Da Polenza and financed by the Italian National Research Council (NRC). Da Polenza, by the way, had been the second leader of the huge 50 Anniversary Italian expedition to K2 last summer.
They used both the modern GPS and traditional methods, and the results of the measurements completely dismissed the rumor. Everest was still the highest mountain of all. The resulting study was widely publicized, and Desio obtained support to launch a second stage of the EV/K2 CNR project: The building and maintenance of the Pyramid-laboratory at the foot of Everest (5050m). The Everest pyramid was set up in 1989 (35 years after the K2 expedition) and is still in order.
At the launch of the Pyramid, Ardito was 92, and his life now slowly faded away. He managed to squeeze another 12 years out of it, but died finally on December 12, 2001 in Rome at 104 years old. The "happy man" had by then explored most of the world he so cherished, and entered history.
Italian Ardito Desio died on December 12th 2001, at the tender age of 104. In his life, he had traversed the burning sands of Sahara and the frozen plains of Antarctica, led more than 15 scientific expeditions, traveled the world, and climbed the highest mountains. Ardito was in fact the leader of the Italian expedition that conquered K2 with the summit of Achille Compagnoni and Lino Lacedelli.
More than forty years after the K2 expedition, Americans John M.Climaco and Chris Breenere climbed a Himalayan virgin peak and named it after Ardito.
Image of Ardito in polar outfit in the McMurdo Antarctic station, courtesy of the Associazione Ardito Desio.
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2004
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