PU expert Demarest relishes mountain climbing accomplishments

BOULDER, Colo.—When Chuck Demarest was 10 years old in 1953, he had mixed feelings when he read a newspaper account of Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay becoming the first to reach the top of Mount Everest.

“I wanted to be the first person,” Demarest said with a smile 62 years later. Despite that initial disappointment, he was thrilled and inspired by the achievement of the two famous climbers.

He had read a book on the Himalayas when he was 8 and developed a strong fascination with Everest, the world's highest peak at 29,028 feet above sea level. It was then he decided he wanted to climb the mountain, which sits on the crest of the Great Himalayas in Asia on the border between Nepal and Tibet.

Growing up in Glen Ridge, N.J., far from the mountains, his goal thereafter was to follow in the footsteps of Hillary, from New Zealand, and Norgay, a Sherpa from Nepal, and conquer Everest. Sherpas are native to the region and long have played key support roles in Himalayan climbs because of their strength, climbing skills, knowledge of the mountain, endurance and genetic natural aptitude for the altitude.

In most cases, wild dreams of youth give way to reality when adulthood arrives.

That was not the case with Demarest. He had goals and ambitions, including Everest, and he stuck with his plan. While attending Princeton in the early 1960s, he worked in Colorado during summer breaks and began honing his mountaineering skills in the Rockies.

After graduating from Princeton in 1964, he headed to Boulder for graduate work in nuclear physics, the Rockies and, a year later, the launch of a small business, polyurethane inline skate wheel producer Kryptonics Inc.

He also became a serious climber.

He joined the Rocky Mountain Rescue Group in 1966 and became skilled in aiding injured and lost climbers and bringing them down the mountains. As with all mountains, in some cases climbers don't survive.

He's been a member of the group for 49 years and has participated in more than 1,000 rescues.

Meanwhile, Demarest continued to build an impressive career in the polyurethane industry, where he has proven to be a highly recognized innovator and entrepreneur.

For instance, while heading Kryptonics, Demarest, a commercial pilot, started and ran a helicopter business in Colorado.

Demarest, who has been married to his wife Judy for 35 years and is the father of four, also created hundreds of polyurethane formulas for various products. And his reputation in the urethane industry spread.

In addition, he has been an active member of the Polyurethane Manufacturers Association for decades.

He eventually sold Kryptonics and launched other businesses in the urethane sector, most of which were successful. He built them up and sold them too, the last being polyurethane-product producer Aragon Elastomers, which was purchased by the Hanson Group in 2010.

Lee Hanson, owner and president of the group, said at the time he bought Aragon because it was a solid business and he wanted to add the expertise of Demarest to his company.

Demarest has remained with the firm as a consultant and developer of new technology.

Throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, he continued to branch out as an expert mountaineer. He headed off to and conquered some of the world's tallest mountains, including the highest peak in Europe, Russia's Mount Elbrus; Chimborazo in South America; Cho Oyu, the sixth highest in the world at 26,906 feet, in Tibet; and Lobuche Central in Nepal.

But Mount Everest was always there, lurking and waiting. Demarest made his first attempt to climb the world's tallest mountain in 1995.

He reached the south summit, just 300 feet below the top of Mount Everest, with several other climbers, including Rob Hall and Doug Hansen. Both Hall, an accomplished mountain climber and guide, and Hansen would lose their lives a year later, among a group of eight who died during a May 1996 blizzard that is among the most tragic accidents in the history of climbing Everest.

In 1995, however, “Rob Hall's team and my group turned back due to unstable snow on the knife edge ridge between the south summit and the 300 feet to the final summit,” Demarest said.

“I remember, Rob turned to me and said, "Chuck, we're going to turn back. If you want to go on, good luck to you.' I didn't want to die in an avalanche 100 meters below the top. So I started back with them.”

That was a big disappointment, he admitted. But he vowed to return one day and finish what he started.

Demarest didn't wait too long to take another crack at Everest.

In 1998, he was part of the Everest Environmental Expedition, an 11-member team led by Bob Hoffman. The team planned to rid Everest of as much trash—such as oxygen tanks and a variety of gear and other debris left by previous climbers—as possible.

Hoffman's crew made relatively good time over the first several days of the ascent, and in May some members were well on their way to the top. The ever changing weather was always the biggest concern, Demarest recalled.

“In our case, there was a large cyclone moving toward the mountain when we were at Camp 3 at 24,000 feet on our summit push,” he said. “We were advised that if it continued on course, it would strike in two days and would drop 6 to 10 feet of snow.

“It turned east, but I could see the wall of clouds in the distance from the summit two days later.”

Demarest was fortunate and adapted pretty well to the dwindling air supply as he neared the top. The summit, he said, is two-thirds of the way through the atmosphere, with air pressure there at 5 psi, compared to 15 psi at sea level.

“I used oxygen from the South Col (the sharp-edged pass that's typically ravaged by high winds located between Everest and Lhotse, the fourth highest mountain in the world) to the summit. I only had winds of 15 miles an hour when we left the South Col at 11:30 at night. I was essentially going solo for the last part.”

He reached the 29,028-foot summit at 10 a.m. on May 20. He was able to be patched into his wife in Colorado via a two-way radio while standing on the summit. “I said, "Guess where I am?' We talked for about a minute.”

He remained atop Everest for about a half hour. He removed his oxygen mask, enjoyed the view and took a few pictures before descending back to the base camp.

When Demarest's team ultimately arrived at the bottom of the mountain several days later, they carried with them 400 pounds of trash and 150 empty oxygen containers left behind by earlier climbers.

Looking back, he said, other mountains were technically more difficult, but Everest “is a huge challenge considering the extreme altitude, the ice fall danger and some difficult climbing high on the mountain, considering the wind, cold and oxygen equipment.”