Expeditions Archive - Page 6 of 17

19. July 202219. July 2022

Denis Urubko scales Broad Peak without breathing mask

Denis Urubko published this picture today on Facebook

He is still able to do it. Denis Urubko informed that he reached the summit of the 8,051-meter-high Broad Peak in the Karakoram today. In February 2020 – after a failed winter attempt on the same mountain – Denis had still declared his eight-thousander career over with the words “(It) Is Enough!”. By his own account, he had summited eight-thousanders 22 times by then, always without bottled oxygen, sometimes on new routes, in winter or solo.

12. July 202212. July 2022

Sigurjonsson’s family asks the climbers on K2

John Snorri Sigurjonsson (1973-2021) on the summit of K2 in summer 2017

Actually, it should go without saying. But what is self-evident in times when, for some, the only thing that seems to matter on the mountain is making it into the headlines? It is not only the truth that tends to fall by the wayside, but also empathy. The family of Icelandic climber John Snorri Sigurjonsson, who died on K2 in the winter of 2021, has asked summit aspirants this summer season to show reverence and not to film or photograph John’s body.

The body of the Icelander is still lying in the summit area, above the so-called “Bottleneck”, the avalanche-prone key section of the normal route at around 8,400 meters – latched into the fixed rope. That the request of Sigurjonsson’s family is not superfluous is proven by the countless pictures circulating on the Internet of the corpses of climbers who have died on Mount Everest, for example.

7. July 20228. July 2022

When communication breaks down on the mountain

Broad Peak (with the shadow of K2, photographed in 2004)

4G network in the base camps at the foot of Mount Everest or K2 – climbers have now become accustomed to being able to communicate with their smartphones even on the two highest mountains in the world. In this way, they receive the latest weather reports in a simple and, above all, extremely fast way or can also maintain contact within their teams by cell phone. Not as in the past with radios or the considerably more expensive satellite phones. In recent days, however, expeditions in Pakistan have reported communication problems with their teams on the mountain.

6. July 20228. July 2022

Fatal fall on Broad Peak

The second fatality of the summer climbing season has occurred on the eight-thousander Broad Peak in the Karakoram. Pakistani climber Sharif Sadpara fell from the summit ridge and has been missing since. The hope of recovering him alive is close to zero.

Describing how the accident happened on Tuesday, Austrian expedition operator Furtenbach Adventures wrote on Instagram: “There is still difficult and limited communication (with Broad Peak base camp) but what we know so far is that our team started from Camp 3 in the night, also fixing the rope to the summit ridge. They were followed by climbers from other teams. Shortly before the summit a following Pakistani climber from a different team fell through a snow cornice on the summit ridge down to the Chinese side. That event halted the summit push for everyone for obvious reasons.”

5. July 20226. July 2022

Italians without bottled oxygen on Nanga Parbat – first fatality of the season

At express speed, six Italian mountain guides from the Aosta Valley at the foot of Mont Blanc have scaled the 8,125-meter-high Nanga Parbat in Pakistan – without bottled oxygen! Marco Camandona, Francois Cazzanelli, Emrik Favre, Jerome Perruquet, Roger Bovard and Pietro Picco climbed via the Kinshofer route, according to Italian press reports, and reached the summit in less than two days on Monday morning local time.

They had decided to rest only at Camp 3 at around 6,700 meters. Cazzanelli set off from base camp at 4,300 meters only after the others and reached the highest point in just 20 hours and 20 minutes. Cazzanelli and Picco had – as reported before – opened a challenging variant to the Kinshofer route in the lower area of the Diamir Face last week and called it “Aosta Valley Express”.

1. July 20221. July 2022

Kristin Harila’s eight-thousander chase: Number 7, Nanga Parbat

The first eight-thousander summit success of the summer season in Pakistan is reported from Nanga Parbat. According to Pemba Sherpa, founder of the Nepalese operator 8K Expeditions, today the 36-year-old Norwegian Kristin Harila and her three companions Chhiring Namgel Sherpa , Pasdawa Sherpa and Dawa Ongju Sherpa reached the summit at 8,125 meters. Kristin thus continued her record chase in the footsteps of Nirmal “Nims” Purja.

Like the Nepalese did in 2019, Harila wants to be the first woman to climb all 14 eight-thousanders in half a year – like Nims with bottled oxygen, strong Sherpa support and, if possible, helicopters to cover the distances between the mountains as quickly as possible. This is unlikely to be realized in Pakistan, where helicopter flights in the north of the country are only permitted to the Pakistani military.

3. June 20229. June 2022

Peter Riemann and the mystery of his winter coup on Cho Oyu

Peter Riemann (Cho Oyu in the background)

Is Peter Riemann now sitting in heaven chatting with Cho Oyu, the “Goddess of Turquoise”, about his solo winter ascent of the eight-thousander in the border region between Nepal and Tibet? Probably, however, he doesn’t make much fuss about it up there either. “He was pretty private and not at all boastful about his accomplishments,” recalls the German climber’s widow, American Carol Davis. “He was fine with his own company.”

Carol is one of apparently very few people Peter let in on his secret about his alleged 1992/93 winter coup: “Peter told me, in no uncertain terms, that he summited Cho Oyu from the Nepal side, alone and without supplemental oxygen. He eschewed supplemental oxygen, and never used it. Also, Peter always climbed alone.”

27. May 202227. May 2022

Kristin Harila in Nims’ footsteps

Do I have a déjà vu? Norwegian Kristin Harila stood on the 8,485-meter-high summit of Makalu today with Sherpas Dawa Ongju and Pasdawa of Nepalese operator 8K Expeditions – with bottled oxygen. According to Lakpa Sherpa, head of the company, it was Kristin’s sixth eight-thousander in 29 days: after Annapurna (28 April), Dhaulagiri (8 May), Kangchenjunga (14 May), Mount Everest and Lhotse (both on 22 May). This was two days faster than Nepalese Nirmal “Nims” Purja in 2019.

13. May 202216. May 2022

Billi Bierling without summit success on Dhaulagiri

Billi Bierling on the slopes of Dhaulagiri

Failure belongs to the ambitious mountaineering – just as to admit this honestly. As Billi Bierling is doing now on Dhaulagiri. “I gave up in Camp 3,” the 54-year-old German climber writes to me from the base camp at the foot of the 8,167-meter-high mountain in western Nepal.

Last Sunday, it took her twelve hours to walk from Camp 2 at 6,460 meters to Camp 3 at around 7,200 meters. Fresh snow and loose snow avalanches had made for difficult conditions.

11. May 202211. May 2022

Rope-fixing team reaches summit of Lhotse – Summit rush expected on Everest

Lhotse in the first daylight (seen from Tengboche)

Not only on Mount Everest, but also on neighboring 8,516-meter-high Lhotse, the normal route is now secured to the summit with fixed ropes. According to the Nepalese expedition operator Seven Summit Treks, the seven-member team in charge of it, led by Sona Sherpa (he was among the ten Nepalese who succeeded in the first winter ascent of K2 in 2021), reached the highest point today. It was the first summit success of this spring season on Lhotse. Nepal’s Ministry of Tourism has issued 127 permits for foreign mountaineers to climb the fourth highest mountain on earth this spring.

10. May 202210. May 2022

Royal style: Sheikha Al Thani on Kangchenjunga

Asma Al Thani (2nd from right) with Nirmal Purja (r.) and Co. on the summit of Kangchenjunga (in front Tenji Sherpa)

Nirmal “Nims” Purja will probably not have to worry about tickets for the FIFA World Cup in Qatar at the end of the year. The Nepalese mountaineering star – in 2019, he scaled (with bottled oxygen) all 14 eight-thousanders in just over six months, in 2021 he was one of the climbers, who succeeded in the first winter ascent of K2 (in his own words, without bottled oxygen) – will certainly be invited to the football tournament as a VIP. After all, the 38-year-old has the best connections to the Qatari ruling family Al Thani. Since the head of the commercial operator Elite Expeditions took Sheikha Asma Al Thani on the rope as a premium client, things have been going well for the 32-year-old on the highest mountains in Nepal.

9. May 202210. May 2022

Summit success reported from Makalu

Now there is also the first success report of the spring season from the fifth highest mountain on earth. According to expedition operator Pionier Adventure, Nepalese climbers Kami Sherpa and Pem Lakpa Sherpa led a client from the U.S. and another from Mongolia to the 8,485-meter-high summit of Makalu today – using bottled oxygen. The success of Pem Lakpa and the Mongolian was also confirmed by the operator 8K Expeditions.

9. May 20229. May 2022

8000er weekend summary: Kami Rita’s record, summit successes and two deaths

“When I’m on Everest, I’m totally focused,” writes record climber Kami Rita Sherpa in his little book “How to climb Everest.” The 52-year-old has done it once again: for the 26th time Kami Rita stood on the roof of the world.

On Saturday, he reached the highest point on earth at 8,849 meters – with bottled oxygen – as the head of an eleven-member team of Climbing Sherpas. The team fixed the ropes to the summit, paving the way for commercial expedition teams. This week, Mount Everest is likely to see its first major summit wave.

Meanwhile, German professional climber David Göttler is practicing patience on his third Everest attempt without bottled oxygen. It’s getting too crowded for now, the 43-year-old writes me. “So I wait.”

5. May 20226. May 2022

Successes reported from Kangchenjunga – summit wave expected on Everest

West, Main, Central and South Summit of Kangchenjunga (from l. to r.) — Kangchenjunga

In the second attempt it obviously worked. After a first summit attempt by a commercial team narrowly failed last week, the first summit successes were reported today from Kangchenjunga, the third highest mountain on Earth. Exactly how many climbers reached the highest point at 8,586 meters is not yet clear. The Nepalese expedition operator Seven Summit Treks initially gave a total of six names.

Among them was the 31-year-old Nepalese photographer Purnima Shrestha, who thus scaled her fifth eight-thousander – with bottled oxygen. Probably also wearing a breathing mask was the 20-year-old Shehroze Kashif, who was the first Pakistani ever to reach the summit of Kangchenjunga. For him it was also the fifth eight-thousander. He has now already climbed the three highest mountains on earth: Mount Everest, K2 and Kangchenjunga. In his native Pakistan, he is called “Broad Boy” – because of his first eight-thousander success at the age of 17 on Broad Peak.

3. May 20225. May 2022

Summit successes reported from the north side of Mount Everest

Everest north side — North side of Mount Everest (in spring 2005)

The first summit successes of the spring season on the highest mountain on earth have apparently the Tibetan north side of Mount Everest. Mingma Sherpa, head of the commercial Nepalese expedition operator Climbalaya with good connections to China, reports that last Friday a team from the Chinese operator Yarla Shampo Expeditions fixed the ropes to the summit at 8,849 meters.

On Saturday, a commercial team of 20 Tibetan climbers and eleven paying clients ascended to the summit (almost certainly with bottled oxygen, if it were not, it would have been announced). Another team is aiming for tomorrow (Wednesday, May 4) as summit day, Mingma informed.