Michael ‘Bronco’ Lane
MAJOR Michael ‘Bronco’ Lane, who has died at 78, was a former SAS soldier who lost five fingertips and all his toes while scaling Mount Everest in 1976.
A native of Manchester, joined the Army in 1961 at 16 and after initial service with the 7th Parachute Regiment, Royal Horse Artillery, he was selected for the Special Air Service in 1967, by which time he already was a veteran of the uprising in the Aden Protectorate.
It was during his time in an SAS Mountain Troop that his interest in adventure developed. He joined the Army Mountaineering Association and between 1972 and 1975, took part in expeditions to the Canadian Arctic, the Indian Himalayas and the Nuptse mountain range in Nepal.
In 1976, he joined the first allmilitary expedition to climb Everest, reaching the summit along with Sergeant John Stokes. But on the way down, terrible weather forced them to spend the night in a snow hole.
With his fellow climber suffering from snow blindness and breathing becoming difficult, Taylor had to remove a glove to open an oxygen bottle. After an hour, his hand was frozen. By morning, both mens’ feet were badly frostbitten.
He would later recall: “Totally exhausted in the darkness we huddled facing each other sitting on our sacks with the bottle between us. In desperation, I took off my outer mitt and wearing just my thin contact glove was able to get a sound coupling. We swapped over the mask every few minutes throughout the long night.”
On returning to Britain, doctors attempted to save Taylor’s frostbitten digits. But the long, hot summer that year worked against his recovery. He reported a tingling sensation in one foot and found that it was infested with maggots, which he removed with a cocktail stick.
He eventually had all 10 toes surgically removed and lost all the fingertips of his right hand. It took six months for his amputated stumps to heal, but he returned to active service soon after and decided to have the 15 amputated digits preserved in formaldehyde. He initially loaned them to the Wellcome medical collection and they are now preserved at the National Army Museum.
Despite the setback, Taylor continued mountaineering and in 1984 led another expedition to Everest and took part in several expeditions to Antarctica. His career in the SAS ended in 1987.
He was awarded a British Empire Medal for the Everest Climb and the Military Medal for valour in another campaign.