This article appeared in The Southern Star in May 2004 and is about Dr. Clare O'Leary becoming the first woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest and phoning her family back home in Bandon from the top of the world!
Shortly after becoming the first Irish woman to reach the summit of Mount Everest on Tuesday, Dr. Clare O’Leary phoned Bandon to tell her family she was on top of the world!
BY LEO MCMAHON
The news was received with joy and delight by her parents Kevin and Alice O’Leary and family at ‘St. Mary’s’, Bandon, at 2.20 (Irish time) on Tuesday morning: "She was in great form and overjoyed, delighted and relieved at conquering Everest", Alice told ‘The Southern Star’.
Clare O’Leary was a member of the 2004 Irish Wyeth Everest Expedition who, along with team leader Pat Falvey of Kerry Pike, Blarney and Cork, proudly placed the Irish tricolour at 29,035 feet above sea level and relayed the news to Bandon and the world.
Other important members of the expedition team were experienced Nepalese climbers, Pat Duggan, a network administrator with Cork County Council, who was base camp and communications manager assisted by Adrian Rahill and Sheila Kavanagh.
Agastroenterologist at Beaumont Hospital, who previously worked at Cork University, the Mercy and South Infirmary Hospitals in Cork, 33-years-old Dr. Clare O’Leary is a past pupil of the Presentation Convent primary and secondary schools in Bandon.
She was introduced to mountaineering as a student of medicine at University College Cork.
In recent years, her sister Carol told ‘The Southern Star’, she has climbed Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, Africa’s highest peak (19,565 ft); Aconcagua, Argentina, the highest mountain in South America (22,835 ft) and the Island Peak in the Himalayan range between Nepal and Tibet.
The 2004 conquest of Everest was particularly satisfying, because around this time last year, the Bandon woman had to endure the heartbreak of being forced to turn back at Camp Four (24,500 ft) when suffering from a stomach bug said Carol who went to meet her and accompany her home.
Pat Falvey, who first climbed the highest mountain in the world in 1995, also had to agonisingly give up just 160 feet from the summit due to lack of oxygen and on the 2004 expedition, John Joyce from Co. Galway had to turn back.
With a strong back up team of Sherpas and sponsorship from Wyeth pharmaceuticals, Sport Corran Tuathail, Irish and Worldwide Adventures and others, said Carol, the 2004 team departed from Cork Airport on St. Patrick’s Day and acclimatised.
As soon as weather conditions were suitable, the climb on the south side of Everest commenced and everything went quite well apart from a rough patch between camps two and three and the disappointment of 2003 was forgotten.
The summit was reached at 6.45am (1.45am Irish) local time.
In a message carried on the irisheverest2004.com web site and made prior to the threeday descent, Clare said: "I set out on St. Patrick’s Day with one goal in mind and that was to reach the top and I’ve done it. I’m really proud to have this honour. We had a strong team under Pat’s leadership and I am very grateful to him and my Nepalese team mates. The experience from our previous attempt has paid off this year and I can hardly express my happiness".
Pat Falvey, aged 45, holds the distinction of being the first Irishman to ascent Everest from both the Nepal and Tibet approaches.
The man who made it to the top in May, 2003 (along with Ger McDonnell from Limerick), Mick Murphy from Leap, congratulated Clare, Pat and all the team.
"This is a significant milestone in Irish mountaineering.
The final leg of Everest takes over nine hours in temperatures way below freezing point and this combined with a lack of oxygen requires pure grit. determination and internal strength", he stated.
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President Mary McAleese commended Clare on her triumph telling her it was "a testament to the determination and talent of both you and your support team. The people of Ireland are tremendously proud of your success and join with you today in your celebrations".
Carol O’Leary said Clare sent a couple of text messages back home during the climb and, as far as she knew, spent around 20 minutes at the summit, where she raised the tricolour, took photographs and contacted Bandon by satellite phone before returning to camp four and proceeding with the descent.
"Support from neighbours and the people of Bandon," said Carol, "has been fantastic".
Their father, Kevin, is managing director of the Kevin O’Leary Motor Group and others in the family are brothers John and Kevin, the latter of whom has travelled to Nepal to meet her ahead of what will be a big welcome home in Cork and Bandon in early June.
Local Fianna Fáil Cllr. Jerry Deasy stated on Tuesday afternoon that Cork County Council should consider a suitable way to honour Clare O’Leary, who has earned a place in the history books by becoming the first Irish woman to conquer Everest:
"It is important that we recognise, not only the enormous achievement of Bandonborn Dr. O’Leary, but that we also recognise that she undertook this challenge to raise funding and awareness for people who suffer from Rheumatoid Arthritis".
• Named after Sir George Everest, the first surveyor-general of India, Mount Everest was first conquered by New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tensing Bhutia in Queen Elizabeth’s coronation year, 1953.
Along with Clare O’Leary, Pat Falvey and Mick Murphy, three other Irish people have reached the summit, the other two being Dawson Stelfox (1993) and Terence ‘Banjo’ Bannon (2003).
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