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NEPAL EARTHQUAKE Jacksonville man who summited Everest will help in Nepal relief efforts Jacksonville man who summited Everest will help in relief efforts Comment By Ryan Pfeil Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Ryan Pfeil Mail Tribune Posted May. 1, 2015 at 2:00 AM Updated May 1, 2015 at 10:23 AM By Ryan Pfeil Mail Tribune Posted May. 1, 2015 at 2:00 AM Updated May 1, 2015 at 10:23 AM » Social News In less than two weeks, Brian Smith will be walking through a rubble-strewn graveyard, the aftermath of nature's recent fury in Nepal. He'll be one of numerous volunteers worldwide going to help the country rocked by a vicious earthquake last Saturday that left 5,500 confirmed dead and thousands more injured. The tasks ahead for the Jacksonville resident, who works as a coroner transport for a private company, are daunting. They include recovering bodies, providing medical aid, distributing food, blankets and water purification tablets and working with affected children, many of whom have been orphaned by the disaster. Anything that's needed, really. He'll join a team and travel through a network of remote mountain villages scattered throughout Nepal. "There are villages everywhere, and there are no roads," says Smith, 45. "There's not electricity to a lot of them, and they're just connected by a network of trails. It's amazing when you're flying ... and you look out the window, and there are just miles and miles of villages with trails connecting them. "The outlying villages, there are reports that a lot of them are just gone." He already had been preparing for a sixth visit to Nepal on behalf of Helping Assist Nepal's Disabled, a nonprofit he started in 2009 whose primary mission is working with disabled children and their families in the region. The earthquake moved up his plans. His motivation comes from his deep affection for the people of Nepal, along with his Christian faith that compels him to care for the afflicted. "I just fell in love with the country the first time I went there," Smith says. "These people have become my family and my friends." The Everest climb Smith caught the Everest bug in the mid-1980s, when he was 15 years old and attending South Medford High School. "I was the geeky kid who always ran down to the library when it was in downtown Medford, the old library, and checked out books on Mount Everest," Smith says. "In those days ... a lot of books were being written because they'd do one expedition a year or every couple of years, so I became fascinated with it." During his senior year of high school, he summited Mount Rainier for the first time. It would be about 20 more years before he'd start the climb up Everest. "In those days it was really hard to get onto Everest. You had to be connected to an expedition, a well-funded expedition," Smith says. In 2006, he started training and planning. He linked up with Mountain Madness, a Seattle-based climbing service, and traveled to Nepal in 2007. The poverty and condition of the country struck him when he landed. One of the first things he saw in Thamel, a tourist hub in the country, was a sackcloth-clad man begging at the city's gate. Leprosy had withered the man's hands and face and eaten his toes away to nubs. Smith began his climb from Everest Base Camp about two weeks later. He arrived at Camp 3 when a cough he'd had for about a month came to a brutal head. It was high-altitude pulmonary edema, a condition that causes fluid to fill the lungs and makes it difficult to breathe. His breath crackled and he heaved pink froth. During a sherpa's scramble to search for oxygen and a mask, Smith lay on a glacier at 21,200 feet and waited. The moon illuminated Everest's snow-washed sides. If I die, Smith thought, at least I'll go out with a beautiful view. Then his thoughts moved on to other things, specifically the people of Nepal. "I was thinking about the people with disabilities, I was thinking about that gentleman with leprosy, and I thought, 'If I survive this, I'm going to do a different direction in life, something with more humanitarian involvement,' " Smith says. "I didn't know what that was at the time." He made it the rest of the way down and received free-flow oxygen and medical support, then journeyed back down to the village of Namche Bazaar, where he recharged and continued healing. Then he gave Everest another go and made it all the way up. It was pitch black the night he reached the top, but for the lightning flashing below and stars above. "I turned in a circle and I thought, 'Wow, there are 7 billion people on the Earth, and for this moment, I'm the highest human on Earth,' " Smith says. "Which was a pretty cool feeling." A country in need Smith spent another week or so in Katmandu before flying back to the U.S. He continued to see poverty and lack of medical infrastructure, more examples like the man stricken with leprosy that stuck out. By 2009, he had formed H.A.N.D. because of what he'd seen. He's since made five trips to the country — a full year all total. Smith says the group has given aid to health camps and colonies for those with leprosy, distributed wheelchairs, given aid to children with cerebral palsy, operated on people with cataracts, handed out mosquito nets and helped with first-response medical emergencies, all among hundreds of villages scattered throughout the remote, rocky region. "They were super gracious to me when I was there," Smith says, adding he has helped some families emigrate to the United States. Smith has been collecting additional donations and supplies in preparation for his upcoming journey. The earthquake has left many people homeless and orphaned and leveled schools, temples and historic sites, he says, and he wants to be part of the solution. This trip will not be Smith's last. He plans to head back several times over the next two years. "Not only right now is there a first-response need, but there's going to be a long-term need, as well," he says. "The plan is to set up leaders and volunteers throughout different remote villages that can work with these children." The cleanup will be a long-term process. Smith says the country is still getting slammed by aftershocks, leaving many with motion sickness. "They feel like they're on a rolling boat because these aftershocks hit every 20 minutes, last for 30 seconds, and everything's swaying," Smith says. "They literally feel nauseous all the time. Sea sickness basically." Smith is aware of the risks that await, and says it will be difficult to be away from his wife and daughter, almost 2 years old. He'll lose contact with everyone for at least five days when he starts his journey. "Going to Nepal on a good day is dangerous," Smith says. "Now it's going to be incredibly dangerous, really." Despite all that, he still thinks about that night on Mount Everest when the people of Nepal lent their hands to help him off a mountain and get back on his feet. Now he's ready to lend his own. For more information about H.A.N.D., see www.handnepal.org . Reach reporter Ryan Pfeil at 541-776-4468 or by email at [email protected] . By Ryan Pfeil Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Ryan Pfeil Mail Tribune Posted May. 1, 2015 at 2:00 AM Updated May 1, 2015 at 10:23 AM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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