LINCOLN Hall was one of Australia's great adventurers.

Born in 1956, he was one of Australia’s pre-eminent climbers, scaling mountains in the Himalayas, the Andes and Antarctica.

He was part of the first Australian team to climb Mount Everest in 1984, but suffered altitude sickness and did not make the summit.

He made a second attempt to reach the top of the world in May 2006, and succeeded.

During his summit, he passed five dead bodies in what is fittingly known as "the death zone" - the area around 8000m.

He suffered a cerebral oedema while descending from the summit, which left him disoriented and suffering extreme fatigue. Sherpas tried for hours to save him, but attempts to give him oxygen failed, and he collapsed.

He was left for dead. The sherpas were instructed to cover him with stones, but there were none, so his body was left exposed on the brutal mountain face. His pack, carrying water, clothing and a head torch were all removed.

Twelve hours later he was found alive by another team ascending the mountain. By this time, his death had been publicly announced.

He lost the tips of all his fingers and a toe from extreme frostbite. He had lost most of another toe in an earlier case of frostbite.

He was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia in 1987 for his services to mountaineering.

He was founding director of the Australian Himalayan Foundation in 2003.

His autobiography Dead Lucky was published in May 2007

He was married, with two children and lived in the Blue Mountains in NSW until his death due to mesothelioma on March 21, 2012.

