The year Erik Weihenmayer became the first blind person to conquer the tallest mountain in the world.

Led by his close friends, and roped, Erik jumps crevasses to reach the summit.

When asked about this feat, he said, “I was confident I could do as well as anyone who goes to that mountain. And I knew I could turn back gracefully if necessary.”
Just 5 years before this achievement, 15 climbers died in a storm that trapped 3 groups near the summit. It was Everest worst death toll for a single year.

Despite the tragedy and being criticized as a potential liability for his team, Erik said:

“… I refused to be the weak link of the team. I wanted them to put their lives in my hands as I would put mine in theirs. I would carry my share. I would contribute as any other team member. I would not be carried up to the mountain and spiked on top like a football. If I were to reach the summit, I would reach it with dignity.”

Nicknamed Super Blind or Blindenheimer by close friends, this ex school teacher is not only the first blind person to summit Mount Everest but also one of only about 100 people to successfully summit the highest peaks of the world’s seven continents.

In 2004, Erik and Everest team members went to Tibet to train blind students on a climb to the Rombuk Glacier on the north side of Mt. Everest.

In a country that believes that blindness is a sign that evil spirits are present – Erik challenge the local superstitions.

Erik said, “These were blind kids who were told they had evil spirits inside them, kids who were tied to beds in dark rooms, kids who were sold in and out of slavery.”

Once treated like lepers, the pupils of Sabriye Tenberken (also blind) ultimately stood together at 21,500-feet – higher than any other team of blind people in history.

When he’s not climbing or at home with his wife, Ellie and daughter, Emma, Erik is usually at a speaking engagement. He still climbs approximately 50 days a year.

Traveling across 5 continents, Lewis was robbed and beaten several times on his journey and had to dodge bandits, pirates and was once questioned as a spy in Egypt.

He said,

“Peddling across the Atlantic we encountered some pirates along the north coast of Cuba, by that point in the voyage we were both stark naked, because we had no need for clothes on the Atlantic, so when this boat came along up side and these guys with semi automatics were checking us out and seeing whether we had any nice gear on board, any electronics, they looked at us and we must have looked absolutely mad cause this was day 100 out of 111 voyage and they just like turned on their heels and went back to Cuba, because they probably thought they were going to catch some hideous disease from us or something if they came on board.”

Continuously lacked funding, Lewis had also worked as a cattle drover in the US and in a funeral parlor in Australia.

Jason originally expected his journey to take only 3 and a half years but was delayed by accident that left him with 2 broken legs in Colorado (he was knocked down by an elderly driver as he was rollerblading), a crocodile attack in Australia and a bout of depression.

He started the journey on 12 July 1994 when he was just 26.

A feat only accomplished by 600 swimmers in over 130 years, John Maclean became a national hero and an inspirational swimmer when he became the first wheelchair athlete ever to swim across the trecerous channel.

Disabled after a cycling accident, John refused to sit back and let the world go by. Instead, set himself an unthinkable goal. To accomplish what even most able bodies won’t go.

In 2001, he finished the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race, one of the most grueling and dangerous yacht race in the world. A cold, bumpy, and very challenging race, it is typical for a considerable number of yachts and crewmen to retire.

An incredible athlete, John Maclean was also the First Wheelchair Athlete to complete the Hawaiian Ironman Triathlon. In his third attempt, he finished the 3.8km ocean swim, 180km cycle leg and 42.2km marathon in the 946th place, beating 425 able-bodied athletes.

A few months after the crossing the English Channel, John established the John Maclean Foundation. A way of providing assistance to others, the foundation provides support and assistance to Australian wheelchair users under the age of 18.

To learn more about the foundation please visit: John Maclean Foundation

Flying over the mountains on Friday the 13th, the young men and their families who boarded the charter plane joked about the unlucky day when the plane’s wing hit the slope of the mountain and crashed.

On impact, 13 passengers were instantly dead while 32 others were badly wounded.

Hoping to be rescued, the survivors waited in the freezing -37C temperature, melting snow for drinks and sleeping side by side to keep themselves warm. Food was so scarce, everyone had to pool whatever food they can find for a rationed pool.

Desperation and Hunger
As their supply ran out, the survivor tried to eat strips of leather torned from their baggages. The brutal weather and high attitude of Andes had increased their bodies need for energy and food astronomically.

9 days after the crash, due to dire desperation and hunger, the survivors called for an important meeting. One member proposed that they eat the dead.

“If we don’t eat, we’ll die. If you want to see your family again, this is what you must do”, he said.

The 2 hours meeting ended with a conclusion. If any of them died in Andes, the rest had the permission to use the corpse as food.

No Hope
After 2 weeks, their hope of being found dashed when they found out via their radio transistor that the rescue effort was called off. Authority believed that the rescue was very dangerous and the chances of finding survivors too slim.

On the 60th day after the crash, Nando Parrado and 2 other friends decided to walk through the icy wilderness for help. By the time they left, Nando Parrado said, the crash site was “.. an awful place, soaked in urine, smelling of death, littered with ragged bits of human bone and qristle”.

Wearing 3 pairs of jeans and 3 sweaters over a polo shirt, he and his friends trekked the mountains with human flesh as their ration.

Knowing that they must search for rescue, the team endured frozen snow, exhaustion and starvation, walking and climbing for 10 days before finding their way to the bottom of the mountain.

The rescue
The team was finally helped by Chilean farmer who called the police for help. Parrado then guided the rescue team via a helicopter to the crash site.

On the 22nd December 1972, after enduring 72 brutal days, the world founds out that there were 16 survivors who cheated death, in the mountain of Andes. 8 of the initial survivors died when an avalanche cascaded down on them as they slept in the fuselage.

During the ordeal, Nando Parrado lost 40 kg of his weight. He lost half his family in the crash.

He is now a motivational speaker.

Reference: http://www.parrado.com/eng/main.html

Even when he finally did, he uttered his words twice. When he started school, he still had speech difficulty until the age of nine.

Born in a German city called Ulm, his mother believed Einstein was a freak because his head seemed to be too big for his body.

Her worry had some basis because Einstein actually suffered from a medical condition called “Benign Macrocephaly”, a disorder that could lead to mental retardation.

One of the most recognized and well-known scientists of the century, he was awarded a Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on photoelectric effect titled: “On a Heuristic Viewpoint Concerning the Production and Transformation of Light”.

Upon his death, his brain was preserved and studied.

A 1999 study done by Mcmaster University found that his brain did not have it’s parietal operculum region, a part of the brain needed for speech, reading or writing.

To compensate for that, his brain adapted by enlarging his parietal lobe by 15% wider. This part of the brain is responsible in giving him superior mathematical thought, visuospatial cognition, and imagery of movement.

The study also found that Einstein’s brain had 73% more glial cells ( special cells that provide support and nutrition to the brain) than normal brains.

The Kinko’s founder was dyslexic, failed second grade and was tutored extensively without any success. In 1950’s the affliction was so rare, his family couldn’t understand why he didn’t know the alphabet.

He was even sent to a school with retarded children.

Started Kinko’s in a converted burger stand, Paul has grown his company to 23,000 employees and successfully make “Kinko’s” is to copy centers what “Xerox” is to copy machines.

As a small, unknown inventor during that time, Honda pawned his wife’s jewelry as the capital for his piston ring business only to seen it being destroyed.

Because cement and steel were scarce, he collected discarded gasoline cans from American jet fighters for a new factory. Not long after that, an earthquake destroyed the building.

Despite endless challenges, he pursued his seemingly impossible dreams.

Now, Honda is one of the largest automotive company in the world.

With the help of his 81 year old coach, the potato farmer went through the race in over 5 days without sleep, breaking the race record by 9 hours and win the heart of a nation.