The normal route on the Nepalese south side of Mount Everest is secured with ropes up to the South Col at an altitude of just under 8,000 meters. The ten Nepalese climbers responsible for this reached the final camp site on the route to the 8,849-meter-high summit yesterday, Friday, at 7:15 p.m. local time. Today,…
It’s only official once it’s in the Nepal Gazette. You should always keep that in mind when you read about reforms in the Himalayan state. Because in Nepalese politics, ideas are often discussed aloud. The media then usually communicate them as if they were already a done deal. However, many proposals end up back in…
When I close my eyes and think back to the North Face of Mount Everest 20 years ago, I see the so-called Supercouloir in front of me. The Japanese Couloir in the lower section and the Hornbein Couloir further up run through the wall like a straight line. An aesthetic line, a route that seems…
On the Tibetan north side of Mount Everest, several members of the team led by American ski mountaineer Jim Morrison have apparently reached the summit at 8,849 meters today. This was reported by the Nepalese internet portal “The Tourism Times,” citing sources close to the expedition. The mountaineers climbed through the Hornbein Couloir, it said….
I must admit that I have almost given up trying to keep track of who has climbed how many eight-thousanders, when, and in what style. There are now so many commercial expeditions that it is – at least for me – hardly possible to keep track of them all and verify their success stories, which…
It shouldn’t surprise me anymore, because it’s nothing new. And yet I am always astonished at how quickly and comprehensively the media avalanche rolls in as soon as Mount Everest comes into play. That wouldn’t be so tragic if those involved in the information industry would take the trouble to check the facts before blasting…
French climbers Benjamin Vedrines and Nicolas Jean have filled in a blank spot on the map of high mountains. The strong duo climbed the 6,808-meter-high Anidesh Chuli in eastern Nepal, not far from the eight-thousander Kangchenjunga, in one day – in alpine style, i.e. without bottled oxygen, without fixed high camps, without fixed ropes, and…
“In 1980 on Everest, I was more wiped out than ever before and not even after that,” Reinhold Messner told me five years ago when we talked about 20 August 1980—the day he stood alone on the summit of the highest mountain on earth. “I had fantastic weather, was very well acclimatized and made very…
Fierce gusts of wind have caused a forced respite on Mount Everest and the other eight-thousanders in Nepal. This gives me the opportunity to summarise the events of the past three days. After the rope-fixing team from the Nepalese expedition operator 8K Expeditions – as reported – achieved the first summit success of the spring…
It’s like an annual ritual. It is eagerly awaited how early in the spring season the rope-fixing teams reach the highest point of Mount Everest at 8,849 meters. A few days later, the commercial teams usually begin their run to the summit – always with the proviso that the weather cooperates. So far this spring,…
The world is increasingly becoming a glacier graveyard. In a study published at the end of February, scientists from 35 research teams determined that glaciers worldwide have lost an average of 273 billion tons of ice per year since 2000. An “alarming increase” has been recorded over the last ten years. Michael Zemp, one of…
This spring’s expeditions on the Tibetan north side of Mount Everest can now formally begin. According to the state news agency Xinhua, the Chinese-Tibetan authorities allowed tourists into the Everest region for the first time last weekend. The region had been closed to visitors after the strong earthquake on 7 January. Experts, who had been…
Jost Kobusch was surprised on Mount Everest by the effects of today’s strong earthquake in Tibet in his tent at an altitude of around 5,700 meters. “At first I thought a serac (block of glacial ice) had gone off next to me,” the 32-year-old German mountaineer tells me on the phone. “Then I realized that…
The border region between Tibet and Nepal not far from Mount Everest was shaken by a strong earthquake today. According to Chinese reports, it reached a magnitude of 6.8 on the Richter scale, while the US earthquake observatory measured a magnitude of 7.1. Chinese state media reported at least around 120 dead and hundreds injured…
“I lifted up the sock and there’s a red label that has A.C. IRVINE stitched into it. We were all literally running in circles dropping F-bombs.” This is how the US climber and filmmaker Jimmy Chin described to the magazine “National Geographic” the moment when he and his team discovered remains of Andrew Irvine on…
