Ad astra means “to the stars” and it was Sean Egan’s personal motto throughout his adult life. The 63-year-old University of Ottawa professor was an ardent proponent of total fitness and health, who took on incredible physical and mental challenges. He died on April 29 while attempting to climb Mount Everest to reach — literally — the top of the world.
Fittingly, a charity set up in Egan’s memory to raise $150,000 for a school in Kathmandu, Nepal is called the Sean Egan Memorial Fund - Ad Astra. The design plans are already underway for a two-storey brick and concrete school that will accommodate more than 130 pupils. Construction is expected to start in early 2006 and will be completed within two years.
Expedition members and Egan’s family are working with Child Haven, a registered international children’s charity. Donations can be made to the memorial fund at www.childhaven.ca/donate.htm.
A fellow climber, Gabriel Filippi, from Gatineau, paid a special tribute to Egan when he reached the summit of Everest on May 30. Filippi left behind a kata (a scarf blessed by a monk and worn by climbers) with the departed climber’s ashes inserted in a small pocket and the dates “1942-2005” written on it.
Meanwhile, uOttawa sports psychology PhD student Shaunna Burke became the second Canadian woman to reach the Mount Everest summit on May 29. It was Burke’s second attempt and it, too, was fraught with adversity as her team-mate and expedition leader, Ben Webster, broke his leg in two places in an accident on the Khumbu Ice Fall and had to be airlifted out.
Another climber, uOttawa alumna Peggy Foster abandoned her quest to reach the summit just 300 metres from the top over fears of exhaustion. Foster was trying to become the first Canadian woman to climb the seven highest mountains on the world’s seven continents.
