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CNN Saturday Morning News

Disabled Climbers Poised to Top Mount Kilimanjaro

Aired September 01, 2001 - 08:22   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: In northeastern Tanzania, Mount Kilimanjaro towers 19,300 feet, the highest point in Africa. Five climbers are nearing the summit. Three are blind, one visually impaired. The fifth lost an arm to cancer.

Well, they've contacted us via satellite phone and we're talking with Julius Wilson, who says they're now about 3,700 feet from the summit.

Good afternoon, Julius.

JULIUS WILSON, DISABLED CLIMBER: Good afternoon. How are you?

PHILLIPS: Good. Thank you so much for calling us.

WILSON: Thank you.

PHILLIPS: Listen, tell me, describe to me now, I understand that you are one of the blind climbers.

WILSON: Yes.

PHILLIPS: So describe to me the smell, the feel, the sounds.

WILSON: Well, right now we really cleared out all the dust because right now we're actually sitting inside of the clouds. So it's a bit chilly out here and, you know, there is the clouds and when the clouds clear up a little bit, the sun happens to be quite sharp. We're actually on the equator so you sunburn real easily. So it becomes quite warm. But when it clouds up, which we are in right now, it's pretty chilly.

PHILLIPS: Is this everything that you expected or did you have any expectations of this trip?

WILSON: Well, I did have expectations but I didn't think it was going to go, I mean it just seems a long time. We've been trekking for a while. It's really strong. I thought of this two times in my life and I really can't wait to get on this British Airways plane and get back home. But we're going to take it to the top at 12 midnight tonight.

PHILLIPS: Midnight, huh?

WILSON: Twelve midnight we're going up.

PHILLIPS: So, Julius, what made you decide to do this?

WILSON: Well, it was, I got the opportunity from people at Achilles, achillestrackclub.com. You can reach them. But we were, they were speaking with a couple of gentleman with Achilles and they decided to put it together because some people from New Zealand had done it before. And we said wait a minute, we can send an American team out there. We can do this.

So we knew that we were all athletes. We were all marathoners. And we said OK, we came up with this together and we're going to do it. We put it together and put together a training regime and got together with the New York Sports Club and we thought we're going to put this together and we're going to make it work.

So here we are now at 15,600 feet, I think. (UNINTELLIGIBLE) ready to go up.

PHILLIPS: You can't stop now, Julius.

WILSON: Excuse me?

PHILLIPS: You can't stop now.

WILSON: We can't stop now, no. It will still be, I mean once you're in the clouds, it's so exhilarating. It's just open. It's like complete freedom. You're walking in the heavens. It's wonderful. You can't beat it.

PHILLIPS: Well, tell me more about that. How has it affected your mind and your soul? Just by your description I can tell that it's empowered you quite a bit.

WILSON: Well, actually, I mean I'm from the valleys of, you know, Brooklyn. And to actually come to the top of the mountains in East Africa -- so I'm just loving it, you know? This is pretty much home, you know? I probably came from West Africa. I'm in East Africa right now loving it. Although I can't see all of Africa right now I see the highest point. So I'm really just enjoying this. This has really just been soul searching for me to interact with the people and really just enjoy this. It's great. It's good.

PHILLIPS: Well, we'll be following you and the other climbers. Julius Wilson, we salute you. Thanks so much for joining us and good luck this afternoon.

WILSON: Well, actually, I want to thank Rudy Emphon (ph) for making sure that we had this phone to make sure that we can contact you. And thank you for giving us the time and the play to get our point across. Thank you very much there.

PHILLIPS: Absolutely, Julius.

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