This time the point of return was at about 8,000 meters. The climbers, who have been fixing the ropes for the Chinese expedition on Mount Everest via the Northeast Ridge towards the summit, had to turn back today. Deep snow and also rockfall stopped them, a representative of the Chinese mountaineering authority said.
According to his words, the team was exhausted and decided to return to Advanced Base Camp at 6,500 meters. The climbers had spent the night in Camp 2 at 7,950 meters.
Actually seven climbers from the team of the Chinese expedition operator Yarla Shampo wanted to fix the ropes up to the summit of Mount Everest at 8,850 meters today. However, according to information from Tibet, nothing came of it. The wind blew too strong over the highest mountain on earth. According to Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, who has close contacts with the Chinese expedition, the team turned back at 8600 meters. The climbers had spent the last night in Camp 3 at 8,300 meters. For Wednesday the meteorologists expect even higher wind speeds.
The mountaineers of the Chinese expedition on the north side of Mount Everest must train themselves in patience. The clients of the operator Yarla Shampo are currently staying in the Advanced Base Camp (ABC) at 6,500 meters, Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, who is in contact with members of the team, informs me. In the course of further acclimatization, he said, a night on the North Col and an ascent up to 7,500 meters is planned – if conditions permit. Currently, the avalanche danger seems to be too great. According to Mingma, the mountaineers who secure the route to the summit with fixed ropes and who already reached an altitude of 8,300 meters, have descended to the ABC.
Actually the first summit success on Mount Everest in 2020 was scheduled for this Sunday. Until then, the rope fixing team of the Chinese expedition on the north side of the mountain wanted to have worked their way up to the highest point at 8,850 meters. But due to snowfall, the Tibetan climbers returned to the Advanced Base Camp (ABC) at 6,500 meters, Mingma Gyalje Sherpa informs me, adding that the next good weather window is to be used for the summit push.
Everest ABC on the Tibetan north side (in spring 2015)
What some critics of commercial mountaineering on Mount Everest have demanded in the past is now being brought about by the corona crisis: only one team will be allowed to attempt the highest mountain on earth this spring. The Chinese-Tibetan authorities had closed Everest to foreign expeditions because of the Corona pandemic, but the ban does not apply to domestic expeditions. And so there will probably be a Chinese attempt this spring over the Tibetan north side of the mountain.
According to reports, the team of the operator Yarlo Shampo Expeditions consists of 26 members, including six women. According to sources in Tibet, the climbers were to reach the Advanced Base Camp at about 6,400 meters, below the North Col, today. It has snowed more than in previous years, it said.
Despite the restrictions resulting from the corona pandemic, Mount Everest will apparently not remain completely deserted this spring. There is growing evidence that a Chinese expedition will approach the highest mountain on earth from the Tibetan north side. According to the Kathmandu-based newspaper „The Himalayan Times“, at least 26 mountaineers from China, including six women, will attempt to climb Everest.
Namche Bazaar in the Everest region lives from tourism
I just went shopping at a supermarket. I wanted to buy a kilo of flour. There was a sign on the pallet saying that each customer could only take a maximum of four packages. But not a single one was left there. Three checkouts were open, long lines formed in front of them. Most of the customers had filled their shopping trolleys to the top. Panic in Germany in the face of the coronavirus pandemic. As I stood in line at the checkout, I thought of Nepal. Many people there already lack the most necessary things. How will they survive the corona crisis?
The spring climbing season in the Himalayas is over before it has begun. After the Chinese-Tibetan authorities announced that they would not issue permits for the Tibetan north side of Mount Everest and other mountains to foreign expedition teams this spring, the Nepalese government has now pulled the rip cord too. Due to the global spread of the coronavirus, no permits will be issued for expeditions to Everest and the other high mountains of Nepal from March 14 to April 30, the government in Kathmandu announced. The already issued climbing permits are invalid. It is understood that the regulation also applies to trekking tours.
Even if the decree was withdrawn at the beginning of May, the remaining time for expeditions would be too short. The season finishes at the end of May due to the start of the monsoon season.
The Chinese-Tibetan authorities have closed the Tibetan north side of Mount Everest for this spring season. This I learned from a reliable source. The decision is official, it is said. This had already been indicated in the past weeks.
The Tibetans had advised the expedition teams to travel to the north side of Everest via Kathmandu rather than via the Chinese airport in Chengdu, as is often the case, because of the corona epidemic. The Nepalese authorities declared on Monday that all land crossings to China will remain closed for the time being due to the corona crisis. This would also have made it impossible to travel via the Kerung border crossing.
“It will be the least crowded year on Everest for decades.” Thus Lukas Furtenbach, head of the Austrian expedition operator Furtenbach Adventures, advertised this year’s expeditions to the highest mountain on earth a few days ago. Unlike in previous years, the company not only offers the ascent on the Tibetan north side but also on the south side of Everest – not least because of the still unclear situation caused by the worldwide corona crisis. “We are preparing everything for both sides and are thus prepared to move everything to one (open) side – if necessary”, Lukas writes to me. “Let’s hope for the best!”
Dawa Yangzum Sherpa has already scaled three eight-thousanders
This Sunday is International Women’s Day. Also in Nepal. Nepalese women still have a hard time in high altitude mountaineering. The Nepalese Lhakpa Sherpa, who was born in Nepal and lives in the USA, is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the most successful woman on Mount Everest with nine summit successes. This spring she plans to reach the summit for the tenth time, from the Nepalese south side of the mountain. But the 46-year-old also has difficulties finding sponsors. To be able to finance her project, Lhakpa has started a crowdfunding campaign.
Since Pasang Lhamu Sherpa was the first Nepalese woman to reach the summit of Everest on 22 April 1993 (she died on the descent at the 8,749-meter-high South Summit), 66 ascents have been made by women from Nepal – half of them in the last four years, according to the mountain chronicle Himalayan Database.
Jost Kobusch also designs the end of his Everest winter expedition “deliberately decelerated”, as he says. The 27-year-old mountaineer, who has already been in Nepal since mid-September, will return to Germany only in a week. Jost had attempted to climb Mount Everest solo and without bottled oxygen, on the ambitious, rarely climbed route over the Lho La, a 6000-meter-high pass between Nepal and Tibet, and the West Ridge. He had climbed up to an altitude of 7,366 meters. I reached Kobusch by phone in a hotel in Kathmandu.
Jost, how satisfied
are you with the result of your Everest winter expedition?
I am quite happy. My goal was to reach 7,200 meters. I
managed that, learned a lot, and I am very grateful for this experience.
Alex Txikon (in the background right the 7000-meter-high Pumori)
Mount Everest remains unclimbed in this (meteorological) winter. After the German solo climber had abandoned his last attempt on Tuesday at 7,360 meters on the West Shoulder, the two teams on the normal route also turned back today at about 7,000 meters. “No way to get to Camp 3. 45 centimeter of fresh, unstable snow on the Lhotse Face have proven too dangerous”, Alex Txikon let us know. „We also had some close calls with avalanches yesterday . It’s frustrating, we’re strong and willing to go on, but conditions are unforgiving! We must go down.“ This means that after 2017 and 2018, the 38-year-old Spaniard’s third attempt to climb Everest in winter without bottled oxygen has failed too.
Also the four Sherpas of the “Breathless Winter Everest” team, who showed up at base camp only on Monday and planned a winter speed ascent of the highest mountain on earth, threw in the towel just below Camp 3. Expedition leader Tashi Lakpa Sherpa, like Txikon, pointed out the dangerous conditions in the Lhotse flank: too much unstable fresh snow, underneath blue ice.
Is it over? As Jost Kobusch’s GPS tracker showed today, he descended from the Everest West Shoulder to Lho La. On the 6,000-meter-high pass between Nepal and Tibet he had set up his Camp 1. Yesterday, Monday, the 27-year-old German climber had reached an altitude of about 7,300 meters, but had then climbed down again to his Camp 2 at about 6,800 meters.
Kobusch had set himself the extremely ambitious goal of climbing the highest mountain on earth solo and without bottled oxygen, via the rather rarely climbed West Ridge and the Hornbein Couloir in the North Face. Before his current try he had spoken of the “final attempt”. This was also in line with his announcement before the expedition to break down his tents on Everest by the end of the calendrical winter next Saturday at the latest.
As a dishwasher to the summit of the highest mountain in the world. Lhakpa Sherpa has not only done this once. With nine ascents, the 46-year-old is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the most successful female Everest climber. This spring, she wants to scale the highest mountain for the tenth time. In her first summit success in 2000 from the southern side of Nepal, Lhakpa was the first woman from Nepal to summit Everest and return alive – Pasang Lhamu Sherpa, the first Nepalese woman to reach the highest point in the world in 1993, had died on the descent. Lhakpa achieved her eight other Everest successes climbing from the Tibetan north side.
The Sherpani lives in West Hartford, Connecticut. For twelve years Lhakpa was married
to George Dijmarescu, a nine-time Everest climber born in
Romania. The marriage ended in a “War of the Roses”. A US court finally granded
her custody of their children after the divorce. Lhakpa’s son is now of age,
the two younger daughters still live with her. To earn a living, Lhakpa Sherpa
works 40 hours a week as a dishwasher in a supermarket.
Lhakpa, you want to
scale Mount Everest for the tenth time next spring. Will you do it again over
the Tibetan north side, again with bottled oxygen, with or without clients?
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