Four differently-abled people prove nothing is impossible as they skydive over Mt Everest
KATHMANDU, MAY 01
The sky is the limit for four differently-abled war veterans who have set the record in the Everest region with their adventures in the past few days. The team comprising four such veterans completed two tandem skydives over Mt Everest on April 26 and 27 and proved that nothing is impossible if you wish for it.
The 20-member team comprised four differently-abled skydivers - Hari Bahadur Budha Magar, Martyn Compton, Dean Bousfield, and John Chart - who dived out at 23,000 feet.
This achievement has made Budha Magar the first double amputee to complete tandem skydives in the Everest region. Recently, he became the first double above-knee amputee to trek to Everest Base Camp with prosthetic legs.
"I can't believe I have just skydived over Mt Everest," said Budha Magar, who lost his legs above knees in an Afghanistan war while representing the British Gurkha regiment in 2010. He was fighting for the UK alongside Prince Harry then.
This is not the first adventure of Budha Magar - he has already ascended different mountains with the grade bionic leg attached to his thighs. He has also participated in more than 15 national and international adventure games, alpine skiing, indoor and outdoor rock climbing, kayaking, and cycling.
"It was a nice adventure and inspiration to all war veterans," said Bousfield of his skydiving over Mt Everest.
He was shot in the head by a sniper in Afghanistan while serving in the British Army. The bullet passed through Bousfield's brain, exiting above his right ear - he is the only known survivor of a gunshot of this kind. Bousfield, who remained in a coma for six weeks, decided to have his left arm amputated due to paralysis from his brain injury in 2015.
He is a motivation for many as he has pushed himself to walk again, trek in Nepal and complete tandem skydives over Everest.
"We want to do at least the Everest base camp trek in coming years," said Bousfield, who cycled from Brussels to Paris in 2014, but he called the skydiving over Mt Everest "a bigger challenge".
Meanwhile, John Chart has become the first person affected with Motor Neurone Disease (MND) to skydive over Mt Everest. A former firefighter for 26 years, and a former world champion powerlifter, he was diagnosed with the MND in 2019.
He lost the use of his arms with the progress of the disease. Before his skydiving, free-falling down the face of Mt Everest from a helicopter, this time Chart and his family also trekked through the Khumbu Valley to Namche Bazaar.
Another team member Martyn Compton, who joined the British Army in 2000, was also injured in Afghanistan in 2006 when his troop of small tanks got ambushed. The tank Compton was in was blown in half and the rest of his crew were killed. He was shot twice in his right leg. He remembers little of his rescue, waking up four months later in the UK.
Compton recalled, "I was in Headley Court from the end of February in 2007, which was a rehabilitation centre for injured veterans.
I've got 75 per cent burns to my body, and my leg was injured, so I had to learn to walk again. I needed extensive physiotherapy for my scars and underwent around 500 hours of specialist surgery.
That was my life until 2010 when surgery was less frequent." In 2010, he was diagnosed with PTSD.
Before taking part in the skydiving, these skydivers took part in a week of trekking and training for the jumps challenging themselves to the fullest with the motto of 'never give up' and 'always a little further'.
"We are immensely proud to be able to facilitate this expedition and be a part of this inspirational group - injured veterans supported by veterans," says Olga Winter of the Parabellum Tactical Training, the UK that had facilitated the expedition organised by Pilgrims Bandit Charity.
A version of this article appears in the print on May 02, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.
