Touching the Void

Touching the Void is a 1988 book by Joe Simpson, recounting his and Simon Yates' successful but disastrous and nearly fatal climb of the 6,344-metre (20,813 foot) Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in 1985.

The book won the 1989 Boardman Tasker Prize for Mountain Literature and the 1989 NCR Book Award.

In 2003, fifteen years after it was first published, the book was turned into a documentary film of the same name, directed by Kevin MacDonald. The film won the Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film at the 2003 BAFTA Awards and was featured at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival. In 2014, the book was being used in the English literature AQA GCSE course nationally in England.

Simpson and Yates reach the summit of the previously unclimbed West Face of Siula Grande. Upon descent, Simpson slipped down an ice cliff and landed awkwardly, crushing his tibia into his knee joint, thus breaking his right leg. The pair, whose trip had already taken longer than they intended due to bad weather on the ascent, had run out of fuel for their stove and could not melt ice or snow for drinking water. With bad weather closing in and daylight fading, they needed to descend quickly to the glacier, about 3,000 feet below.

Yates proceeded to lower Simpson off the North Ridge by tying two 150-foot lengths of rope together to make one 300-foot rope. However, because the two ropes were tied together, the knot couldn't go through the belay plate. Simpson would have to stand on his good (left) leg to give Yates enough slack to unclip the rope, in order to thread the rope back through the lowering device with the knot on the other side. With storm conditions worsening and darkness upon them, Yates inadvertently lowered Simpson off a cliff. Because Yates was sitting higher up the mountain, he could not see nor hear Simpson; he could only feel that Simpson had all his weight on the rope. Simpson attempted to ascend the rope using a Prusik knot. However, because his hands were badly frostbitten, he was unable to tie the knots properly and accidentally dropped one of the cords required to ascend the rope.

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