You are missing the point.

A lot of hacker news is about accomplishing goals that others would tell you is impossible or not worthwhile. This article is meant to inspire to you to keep dreaming. It's one thing to climb a mountain for someone, its a whole other feat of accomplishment to carve a hole through one. The determination this guy had should be taken as a lesson; not in hacking, but in attitude and life and then applied to hacking.