When he’s not lecturing about physics and biology, adjunct assistant physics professor Francis Slakey is chasing world records. If he successfully completes a Norwegian surfing expedition this summer, Slakey will become the first person to have climbed the highest mountain on every continent and to have surfed in each of the world’s oceans. Slakey is no stranger to the public eye; his unguided expedition to the summit of Mt. Everest was the subject of the 2000 TV-movie “Beyond the Summit,” narrated by Sharon Stone, and he carried the Olympic torch from the steps of the U.S. Capitol as a part of the 2002 Olympic Games.

How did it feel to hold the Olympic torch in 2002?

That was a blast! That was terrific. I mean it was a somber moment because it was shortly after Sept. 11, [2001], and so the country’s mind was on the tragedy that had happened. It made it even more powerful to be part of the whole thing. So I ran it off the steps of the Capitol, but [I] also went by the Pentagon, and they had a ceremony at the Pentagon. I mean, I was in the company of heroes; that was terrific.

How did you get involved with mountain climbing and outdoor activities?

I’ve been climbing for about 15 years, started out in graduate school. I went to the University of Illinois at Urbana [-Champaign], second-flattest county in the United States. I just got sick of living in flat land, so I took up mountain climbing. I did that when I got back to D.C.

When did you decide to climb Mt. Everest? Was it part of an environmental project?

That is right. [My team’s] mission was to clean up all the garbage that has been building up on the mountain since the 1950s. The weather conditions are extreme. I totally understand that these teams get in bad shape, and then they want to get off the mountain, and so they leave behind their garbage. When we went up there, we cleaned up garbage, oxygen tanks, tents and stuff.

How did you get involved with this organization?

Actually, they contacted me. I’d been thinking about climbing Mt. Everest, and these guys asked me if I wanted to join their team. I didn’t have to think about it long. It took all of about four seconds.

Has it always been a goal for you to climb Mt. Everest?

No, I’m just curious about the mountain. Anyone who climbs mountains is going to be curious about doing Everest. So it was on the list with other climbs.

How many were in your group that climbed up there?

We had a big team. We had 13 Western climbers then there were high altitude Sherpas. We had, I think, about 23 of them there. We hired those guys to clean up the mountain, so every day there were teams going up cleaning up the mountain. So we had a huge expedition, plus we had the camera crew, and also there was a company that underwrote us called CNN Financial News network.

How did the expedition become the one-hour special narrated by Sharon Stone?

Actually National Geo[graphic] had their camera crew there, so it was National Geographic camera crew. They were doing a lot of video dispatches too, so they did a combination of video footage and of audio dispatches.

How much did you clean up on your expedition?

Seven hundred oxygen bottles – one of which is in my house right now. One of the Sherpas came into the camp and said, “I found these really old bottles, five of them clumped together. I don’t know what to make of them,” and so we looked and they were [of an] old style. There was only one expedition that used that style of bottle, and that was an expedition in 1953 and it was [Sir] Edmund Hillary, [one of the members of the two-man expedition that was the first to reach the peak of Mt. Everest]. So these five bottles were actually from his expedition. It was garbage to him, but it’s a collector’s item for me, so we divided up the five oxygen bottles. I have one. Three westerners that summited each got one of them, another one went to a museum in Katmandu.

What are some of the dangers that you encountered on your trip to Mt. Everest?

The obvious ones, I mean everybody knows what the dangers are. The weather was horrible, getting caught in a white out, conditions are rough, you know? The weather was bad, and we were hoping for a good window to climb.

What would you say would be the most dangerous part of climbing Mt. Everest?

Oh, it’s the weather. For a lot of people, the danger’s lower on the mountain. There are big Volkswagen-size chunks of ice just sort of precariously perched at different angles and navigating through that can be hazardous. Climbers have trouble in that section, but if you move quickly through there then the hazard after that is managing the weather.

I’ve heard you aim to surf in every one of the world’s oceans?

I’m hoping by the end of the summer, I’ll be first person to have ever climbed the highest mountain in every continent and surfed every ocean. I wanted to be the first in something, so that’s what I picked.

So what do you think you are going to be doing next?

Well, I’ve got the surfing trip in Norway, and that will wrap [it] up. But the surfing has been fun, too. I mean, my wife met me at base camp in Pakistan, and that can be pretty grueling going up there, and I thought, “Why not go places where she has a little bit more fun?” The beaches are great, so we’ve been taking trips to warmer climates which are pleasant for both of us, so Norway is the next thing. [It will be] a little bit chilly, but [I’ll] surf the Arctic, and then I’m done with the whole “first person to do this” stuff.

– Interview by Julia Cai

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