of the South Col. Three Swiss climbers and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay continued towards the summit, pitching a tent at 8,400m. Two returned, leaving Tenzing and Lambert, who had become firm friends, to make a summit attempt. High altitude mountaineering in 1952 was still in its infancy. Even Swiss organisation and technology were not up to the job and, apart from Tenzing, the Sherpas had little experience. Despite the best plans, Tenzing and Lambert now had to spend a night at 8,400m with no sleeping bags and no stove, producing a trickle of drinking water by melting snow over a candle. The oxygen sets were barely operable and when the two men continued in the morning, they were effectively climbing without oxygen. They struggled heroically, at times crawling on all fours, hindered by the dead weight of malfunctioning oxygen sets, finally grinding to a halt near 8595m, approximately 250m short of the summit. Assuming that George Mallory and Andrew Irvine did not reach higher in 1924, this was the highest than anyone had ever been. Lambert's extraordinary determination was further confirmed that autumn when, alone out of the spring team, he returned for the second Swiss attempt on Everest. This time he and Tenzing were driven back from the South Col by the November jet stream winds and, to the immense relief of the British team, preparing for 1953, the Swiss admitted defeat. After Everest Lambert returned to Nepal in 1954, trespassing across the Tibetan frontier to attempt Gaurisankar. Having failed at Gaurisankar, the expedition attempted Cho Oyu, but was turned back by high winds at about 23000 feet. Lambert returned again to Nepal in 1955 to make the first ascent with Eric Gauchat and Claude Kogan of Ganesh I (7,429m). Subsequent expeditions took him to Pakistan and South America. Then in 1959 he embarked on a completely new career and by 1963, now married with two children, he was a fully qualified glacier pilot, flying to remote and inaccessible icy areas - a vocation which brought him considerable fame until he finally stopped flying in 1987. Ten years later, aged 82, Lambert died near his home in Geneva due to complications of a lung disorder. Honour and respect John Hunt recalls meeting Raymond Lambert in 1953 to learn as much as he could about the Swiss attempt on Everest: "Despite their disappointment, the Swiss were most helpful. However, Raymond told