Five days after the avalanche accident on the 7,932-meter-high Gasherbrum IV in the Karakoram, the two injured Russian mountaineers Sergei Mironov and Mikhail Mironov have been flown by rescue helicopter to a hospital in the northern Pakistani city of Skardu. “Their condition is satisfactory”, informed the Russian embassy in Pakistan, without giving details of the nature of their injuries. Initial reports had spoken of fractures.
According to the Russian mountaineering portal mountain.ru, the search for Sergey Nilov, who died in the avalanche, has been canceled. Too much fresh snow had fallen in the past few days, it said. The snowfall had also delayed the evacuation of the injured. Two days ago, a five-man rescue team had brought the two Russian climbers to a spot at an altitude of about 6,000 metres where a helicopter could land.
Hit by an ice avalanche
Last Saturday, the five-man Russian team, which besides Nilov and the two Mironovs also included Alexey Bautin and Evgeny Yablokov, was hit by an ice avalanche on the ascent of Gasherbrum IV at an altitude of around 6,400 meters. Apparently a serac had collapsed. Bautin and Yablokov had remained unharmed, had been able to descend and raise the alarm. The day after the accident, the crew of a helicopter located the two injured and Nilov’s lifeless body.
The five Russian climbers had come to Gasherbrum IV this summer to retrieve the body of their compatriot Dmitry Golovchenko from an altitude of around 7,000 meters. Dmitry had died on this mountain in 2023. Golovchenko and Nilov had attempted to scale the almost eight-thousander Gasherbrum IV via the unclimbed Southeast Ridge in alpine style – i.e. without high porters, without bottled oxygen, without fixed ropes and without fixed high camps. After almost two weeks on the mountain, 250 meters below the summit, Golovchenko fell to his death. Now, a year later, his friend and rope partner Nilov also lost his life on Gasherbrum IV.
Honoured twice with the Piolet d’Or
The two Russians belonged to the best mountaineers in the world and were known for their pure climbing style. They were honoured twice with the Piolet d’Or, the “Oscar of mountaineering”: for their first ascent of the North Face of the 6,904-meter-high Thalay Sagar (with Dmitry Grigoriev) in the Indian Himalayas and for their first ascent of the Northeast Spur of the 7,284-meter-high Muztagh Tower (with Alexander Lange) in the Karakoram.
In 2019, they survived an 18-day odyssey on the East Face of the 7,710-meter-high Jannu in eastern Nepal. Their luck ran out on Gasherbrum IV. Dmitry Golovchenko died at the age of 40, Sergey Nilov at 47.
