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Caught in a violent storm and blown far off their intended course, five American airmen flying the dangerous Himalayan supply route known as "The Hump" were forced to bail out just seconds before their plane ran out of fuel. To their astonishment, they found they had landed in the heart of Tibet.
Miraculously, all five survived the jump. But their ordeal was just beginning.
After crossing some of Tibet's most treacherous mountains, the five airmen rode on borrowed mules into the fabled city of Lhasa. Their arrival was not a matter of choice; instead they were escorted to Lhasa by a suspicious Tibetan government, trapped in a tightening vise between China and the West.
The five were among the first Americans ever to enter the Forbidden City (two years before Heinrich Harrer, author of Seven Years in Tibet), and among the last to see it before the Chinese launched their invasion.
While in Tibet, the five Americans had to confront what, to them, seemed a bizarre - even alien - people. At the same time, they had to extricate themselves from the political turmoil that even then was raging around Tibet's right to be independent from China.
To avert an international incident - and to assure their own safety - the five men were forced to leave Lhasa in a hurry. They set out, in the middle of winter, on a perilous journey across the Tibetan plateau - only to find themselves caught in a desperate race against time.
Lost in Tibet is an extraordinary story of high adventure, cultural conflict, and political intrigue. It also sheds light on the remarkable Tibetan people, just at that moment when they were coming to terms with a hostile outside world.
Lost In Tibet: The Untold Story of Five American Airmen, a Doomed Plane, and the Will to Survive, Richard Starks and Miriam Murcutt, The Lyons Press, Paperback, 2004, 205 Pages, $16.95
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