Siula Grande: Over the Edge | Long Way Down | 2
Against The Odds
Wondery
4.7 • 7.2K Ratings
🗓️ 9 September 2025
⏱️ 46 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
After Joe Simpson fractures his leg, his climbing partner Simon Yates begins lowering him down the mountain, 300 feet at a time. But near the bottom, Simon unknowingly lowers Joe over the edge of a sheer cliff. Joe is left dangling in midair, unable to take his weight off the rope. And Simon, anchored above, can’t pull him back up. They trapped in a deadly stalemate.
Our story consultant for this series is Simon Yates. If you’d like to learn more about his adventures in mountaineering, check out his books: Against the Wall, The Flame of Adventure, and The Wild Within - available wherever you get your books.
Order your copy of the new Against the Odds book, How to Survive Against the Odds: Tales & Tips for Animal Attacks and Natural Disasters, for stories of everyday people confronted by life-or-death situations, showing you how they survived—and how you can too. Learn more at SurvivalGuidebook.com.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Against the Odds early and ad-free right now. |
| 0:05.6 | Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. |
| 0:09.6 | A listener note, Against the Odds uses dramatizations that are based on true events. |
| 0:14.8 | Some elements including dialogue may be invented, but everything is based on research. |
| 0:20.5 | This episode contains explicit language. |
| 0:22.9 | Simon Yates crouches in the snow at the base of the cliff, |
| 0:34.1 | untangling the ropes he just used to repel down. He's taking his time. He needs a moment to |
| 0:40.3 | process the situation, to think. Everything happened so fast. Joe is lying in the snow nearby. |
| 0:47.3 | He broke his leg just a few minutes ago trying to climb down. His right knee is swollen and |
| 0:53.3 | twisted in an obvious way. Simon doesn't know |
| 0:56.7 | what to say to him. They still have 4,000 feet to get down, and they both know the score. |
| 1:04.4 | It's 1 p.m. on June 8, 1985, their fourth day on the mountain. They didn't make much progress on their descent yesterday |
| 1:12.6 | and had to spend yet another night in a snow cave at 20,000 feet. |
| 1:17.6 | They ate the last of their food, and this morning they ran out of gas for the stove |
| 1:22.6 | so they can't melt any more snow for drinking water. |
| 1:25.6 | But they weren't too worried. They thought they'd be down soon. |
| 1:29.1 | But then, everything changed. |
| 1:32.3 | Simon was trailing behind Joe when the rope snapped tight, yanking him into the slope. |
| 1:37.8 | When he got up and followed the rope down, he found Joe lying here at the base of a 25-foot |
| 1:43.6 | cliff. |
| 1:45.0 | Joe told him he'd broken his leg. |
| 1:47.0 | His voice was calm. |
... |
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