Ngawang was delirious, stumbling like a drunk, and coughing up pink, blood-laced froth: symptoms indicating an advanced case of High Altitude Pulmonary Edema, or HAPE—a mysterious, potentially lethal illness typically brought on by climbing too high, too fast in which the lungs fill with fluid.* The only real cure for HAPE is rapid descent; if the victim remains at high altitude very long, death is the most likely outcome.
