NEW DELHI — The 22 Sherpas who set out together toward Mount Everest’s Camp 2 on Friday morning were “full of joy and excitement,” but Kaji Sherpa was apprehensive: They were crossing a notoriously dangerous ice field, and they were moving too slowly.

Two of the ladders used to bridge deep crevasses had broken, perhaps under the weight of ice that had fallen the previous night, and the Sherpas were backed up, carrying heavy loads of equipment for their clients. Kaji Sherpa, 39, took a wary look at the jam and sped ahead, so he was some distance away when the avalanche came.

“A cliff of snow, like a house, came directly toward us, and many were killed at the same time,” he said from his hospital bed in Katmandu, Nepal, where he was being treated for broken ribs. “There was nowhere to escape. If there was an open field, we could have dropped the baggage and escaped. But there was snow all around us that could have easily fallen if we stepped on it. So we were helpless.”

During the four-hour wait for help, he heard cries of pain from the dying, he said, and when he was able to look around he saw “the hands and legs of climbers scattered around the avalanche site.” By Sunday, he had come to a decision: He would not scale Mount Everest again, ending his life’s work of preparing the long ascent for Western clients who wait at lower camps.