Since I am both an outdoor enthusiast and a lover of outdoor “gear,” I subscribe to the Adventure 16 newsletter. Adventure 16 is a Southern California outdoor equipment retailer. A couple times a month the local store holds an informal seminar or slideshow about some kick-ass expedition or nature trip that has taken place or soon will. In theory, you’ll be so amped after the presentation that you will buy lots of gear from the store, hoping someday to emulate the feat that you have just heard about. My most recent newsletter featured a blurb about an upcoming event that will relate details about an adventure that I had surprisingly never heard of:
In the 1960’s, the CIA and the Indian Government attempted to deploy a plutonium-powered spy device on Nanda Devi and Nanda Kot in the Indian Himalayas. While Nanda Kot’s device was successfully deployed, Nada Devi rejected all attempts to place the device on her summit and the plutonium was lost and never recovered. In August 2005, Pete Takeda and his crew retraced the spy route on Nanda Kot, visiting the camps used to stage the 1936 first ascent and the spy missions of the 1960’s. Don’t miss this amazing journey! FREE!San Diego Store: Mon., Jan. 9
West Los Angeles Store: Tues., Jan. 10
This sounds like the beginning to a Tom Clancy novel. I am intrigued. Must-learn-more. As you may have expected, there is in fact an entire book written on this subject: Spy On The Roof Of The World : Espionage and Survival in the Himalayas.
In this cross between a travel adventure story and an espionage novel, Sydney Wignall tells how he became an ad hoc spy for a renegade faction of Indian intelligence operatives in 1955. Wignall had set out to climb the highest mountain in Tibet, but was recruited to investigate Chinese military activity in the region. After being caught, he spent months in a rat-infested, sub-freezing cell as he underwent interrogation. When international pressure forced his release, his captors “released” him and two companions in a nearly impenetrable wintertime wilderness and said “Go home.” Yet Wignall survived–and managed to smuggle out vital information. It is an exhilarating story that only now can be told. [Link]
- Renegade faction of Indian intelligence
- Months in a rat-infested cell
- Interrogation
- Impenetrable wintertime
If that list isn’t enough to get me to open my wallet and drop some money on new gear at Adventure 16, then frankly I’m not much of a man.
Wignall disclosed in the book that when he led the Indian mountaineering team in a victorious return from Qomolangma Mountains in May 1965, as soon as they got down from the plane in Palam Airport, New Delhi, they were brought to a secluded place by Balbir Singh, director of Indian intelligence bureau. Singh told Wignall that R.N. Kao (called the first ancestor of Indian intelligence circle), director of the Indian Aviation Research Center, was waiting behind the airplane to see him. R. N. Kao informed Wignall and seven other persons that they would go to the United States to carry out a task two weeks later.
On June 19, 1965, Wignall and his party secretly flew to New York to contact an official in charge of CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) affairs. Afterwards, they were sent by the American side to Alaska to conduct three-week secret training. It was only then they came to know that the CIA of the United States asked them to help install a secret nuclear test monitoring instrument on the 8,598-meter high Kanchanjunga Peak on the Chinese border, so as to come to know the situation in China’s nuclear test base.
After Wignall and his party returned to India, they began, with the help of the US side, making preparations for the mountaineering expedition. The movement proceeded in a very covert manner, so even the then Indian chief of staff of the three services was not in the know…Although there existed many contradictions in US-Indian relations at that time, both sides could easily come to a consensus on this issue, India also closely watched China’s nuclear tests. Just as an Indian personage named Data who had participated in the action said: China’s nuclear power is very advanced, we should collect information in this respect. [Link]
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An example of a SNAP |
And what about that missing plutonium? What was its ultimate fate?
…[The CIA] designed a portable monitoring station designed to be lugged up the mountain in component parts. The whole thing was to be powered by something called SNAP – Space Nuclear Auxiliary Power
Originally designed for the military, SNAP was a cone shaped contraption providing power through several pounds of plutonium. Seemed like a perfect idea, and better than lugging up a ton of batteries, until they lost the damn thing.
In 1965, an expedition headed up the mountain. Two thousand feet from the summit, weather conditions forced the climbers to turn back. They left the monitoring station on the mountain, intending to return and set it up when the conditions permitted.
In 1966, they discovered that an avalanche had swept away the station, plutonium and all. It was buried under thousands of pounds of rock and snow…To this day, the SNAP has not been found. Tests indicated no contamination, so the search for the generator was abandoned. But, despite weak assurances, it’s probably only a matter of time before it breaks. [Link]
How freaking cool! What I would not give to have been a part of the expedition that retraced the original journey…even if it carried the possibility of being irradiated by plutonium 
. As for that book, I will have to get myself a stocking stuffer this year.
I have perfected the art of knowing the Sepiauthor by reading the first line and no more. I’m flawless with Abhi, Manish and Anna but I need more work when it comes to Sajit, Vinod and Ennis. This was a CLASSIC Abhism:
This sums up his role as the MAN of the house and also demonstrates somewhat eccentric reading material – a must for any blogger. Great topics for Abhi to post about: WAR, POLITICS, WAR POLITICS, FIGHTING, MACHINES, SPACE, CAPITAL LETTERS, ROCKS and RAW MEAT.
Manish is more esoteric and loads up the sarcasm. He normally references some funky desi artisan which splits the audience in half. Some say “Hmm, interesting, didn’t know about that guy” the other half say “Damn Manish, I heard about that dude like YEARS AGO and now everyone knows about him thanks to the Vij Magnet.” And the other Mutineditors have to admit, Manish’s titles are the best. But before I sound too gay…
Anna is harder to put a finger on (cor blimey guvnor!) If the line contains ‘Mutineers’, it’s almost a guarannatee it’s AnAnna post. If the opening para is a dense block of text – the poster’s name begins with ‘a’. Anna’s kind of a bit like Manish in some ways, but just as you’re reading it you think “Whoa, this is too gay for Manish, he’s more…mannish. Ah, it must be Anna”. So there you have it, a gay Manish = Anna.
I hope this service has been helpful for you. I know I’ve enjoyed myself.
Oh and Abhi and Anna leave the most in the ‘excerpt’ box, such that more of their posts are visible on the main page – on average.
That’s all I have to say for now.
Don’t forget that Abhi’s links open in a fresh window. That’s how I know if I don’t look at the author. Everybody has their trademark 😉
Bong, this is not to say that I don’t enjoy being held every so often. I do.
Yeah, I don’t open other peoples links unless they open in a fresh window. I don’t like losing my place in the original text and I have a notoriously short attention span. I like everything laid out for me on different plates.
All browsers let you open links in a new window, though: IE (shift+click), Maxthon (drag link or middle-click), Firefox (middle-click).
What is this language that you speak? 🙂
Shift + left click also works in Firefox – new window. A new tab is middle click. Which I actually don’t like.
I could go on for much longer, but I feared SM would take out a trans-Atlantic restraining order if I said more. I’m an editor you see, I notice..er, stuff.
Woah – there was an Indian named Data?
Yes. I was going to point it out but usually only Bong Breaker and Currylingus get my Star Trek references 🙂
Abhi,
This story rocked Indian Parliament in late 70s when Janata Party came to power………..in India, this is now old, old news. I can tell you stories when General Moshe Dayan visited India in disguise – sans eye patch and beard.
They were lot of questions: Who knew? Who authorized? Nehru, Krishnan Menon, etc.
I guess he meant “Datta”, a common short name found in Maharashtra/Konkan
Perhaps some of these fitted with Geiger counters and other radiation detection gear could help in the search …
Some one needs to make a movie out of this whole thing. – Sly can play the CIA backed mountaineer, – Hrithik can play the Indian Intelligence hero – and Anupam Kher can play a rouge Pak ISI agent who is trying to get his hands on the material for nefarious purpose. – Prinyanka Chopra can play Hrithik’s love interest. Finally, Hrithik saves the world by preventing the rogue ISI agent to get his hands on the fissile material, thus saving it from getting into the hands of terrorists.
People, go ahead and improve the story 🙂
I don’t know. That could be dangerous. What if the Plutonium causes Hrithik to, I dunno, sprout an extra finger or some other kind of mutation. That might not go over well with Indian audiences.
aww, too late😉
Abhi, you know my fascination with Hrithik’s triple-thumbs 😀
GAH!
haha DD – that last one is a bit freaky. Please don’t tell me you sit around browsing Hrithik galleries for a glimpse of his extra thumb =)
It’s amazing to see contrast the post with the trail of comments from whence they began.
For some reason, I need to hide.
I read wignall’s read the book recently, and as usual I am skeptical, till more information comes to me! any ways do chetris really cook rice in the nude if so any chetri chics around for a vegan spicy meal
I know this post is over a year old, but I just read a reprinted excerpt of Pete Takeda’s newly published and truly incredible account, An Eye At The Top Of The World in some climbing enthusiant magazine yesterday and immediately felt compelled to share what I had learnt.
It has everything Abhi listed and more: If you like “*possible cause of destruction of all life on Earth,” you’ve gotta pick this one up. Here’s the downlow:
I don’t want to detract from the light-hearted tone of the comments (Abhi, the third thumb reference was awesome), but I’d like to kindly point out again that unbeknownst to most Americans and the rest of the world, the US government, under the Johnson administation, created and then misplaced a spy device containing 4 pounds of plutonium, enough to kill every person on the planet, and it is now lost somewhere near the source of the Ganges. WHERE IS YOUR GOD NOW!
Everest and high mountains used to be pure nature outside the human stupidity and blunder of spies. Unfortunately they are too polluted now with the most toxic chemical of the Earth.