This story is about how mountains can suddenly come to life. It was a summer hike to Pobeda Peak, the highest point in Kyrgyzstan. We climbed to a height of 7439 meters, to the top of the Kakshaal-Too ridge, the peak of the Tien Shan.

Before spending the night, it was necessary to put up tents and set up a camp for the night. Any experienced hiker knows how important it is to choose the right place to camp. And this time our instincts did not let us down: we deliberately made a small detour to stand under a rocky ridge. We thought that in case of an avalanche this would be the safest place.

Suddenly at dawn we heard some terrible roar. We knew that we were definitely safe, there was no snowfall, so we didn’t even get out of the tent – anything can rumble in the mountains. An experienced hiker does not leave the tent for any reason in order to have time to recover during the night in the mountains. How surprised we were when we learned that this was a response to the Chinese earthquake. As a result, the relief subsided by 5 meters, and ice craters formed. But the worst thing is that literally 200 meters from the camp we discovered an ice collapse. It’s good that we weren’t lazy and walked these 100–200 meters, which ultimately saved our lives, because we set up camp in a safe place.