Tibet Archive - Adventure Mountain

16. October 202528. October 2025

Jim Morrison completes first ski descent of Mount Everest’s north face

The North Face of Mount Everest (in spring 2005)

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 almost logical even to amateurs like me. And yet so steep, demanding, and dangerous.

In 2005, I was traveling as a reporter with Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner, Ralf Dujmovits, and Hirotaka Takeuchi, and I admired the Supercouloir for weeks from the Advanced Base Camp on the Central Rongbuk Glacier. The trio’s attempt to climb this route failed at the time due to conditions in the lower part of the wall.

Skill and luck

The fact that ski mountaineer Jim Morrison skied down this combination of two couloirs yesterday and survived unscathed borders on a minor miracle in my opinion.

“When I finally crossed the bergschrund [crevasse between the base of the wall and the glacier], I cried,” Morrison told a reporter from his sponsor National Geographic. “I’d risked so much, but I was alive.” The 50-year-old must realize that, despite all his skiing skill, he also needed luck – and got it.

15. October 202515. October 2025

Summit success reported from the north side of Mount Everest

North Face of Mount Everest (in spring 2005)

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. There is no other source for this information as yet.

According to this information, Morrison planned to ski down from the highest point through the couloir on the North Face of Everest. With his project, he wanted to commemorate his partner Hilaree Nelson, who fell to her death in fall 2022 while attempting a joint descent from the summit of Manaslu, according to The Tourism Times. It is not yet known whether Morrison was able to carry out his plan.

14. October 202514. October 2025

Afsaneh Hesamifard is the first Iranian woman on all 14 eight-thousanders

Afsaneh Hesamifard at the summit of Cho Oyu

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 are mostly published on social media. The periods in which paying clients of commercial operators “tick off” the 14 eight-thousanders are also getting shorter and shorter. Therefore, I make no claim to completeness.

Today, Chhang Dawa Sherpa, board member of the Nepalese operator Seven Summit Treks, announced via Instagram the summit success of a five-member team on the 8,188-meter-high Cho Oyu in Tibet. Afsaneh Hesamifard was also part of the team, completing her collection of the 14 eight-thousanders (with bottled oxygen) – the first woman from Iran to do so.

It took her three and a half years to achieve the feat. Cho Oyu was Afsaneh’s third eight-thousander this year, after Kangchenjunga in spring and Dhaulagiri in fall.

8. October 20258. October 2025

Mount Everest: A little less drama, please!

Kangshung Face of Mount Everest (seen from space)

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 out their news films, videos, and reports on all channels – accompanied by sensationalist headlines and flanked by lurid posts on social networks. On Monday, it happened again.

1. October 20252. October 2025

First ascent of the 6000er Adinesh Chuli – Summit successes on Cho Oyu

Benjamin Vedrines (l.) and Nicolas Jean on the summit of Anidesh Chuli

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 without Sherpa support.

20. August 202520. August 2025

45 years ago: Reinhold Messner’s solo ascent of Mount Everest

Everest North Face in the last daylight (in spring 2005)

“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 good progress in the lower part of the mountain. That made me feel cheerful and confident. A few hundred meters below the summit, however, the weather closed up. Fog crawled up from the south side, spilling down over the ridges and the summit to the north. I was suddenly afraid that I would lose orientation. Tiny snowflakes were drizzling.”

13. May 202514. May 2025

More summit successes on Mount Everest – death and rescue operation on Kangchenjunga

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 on Mount Everest last Friday, around a dozen other mountaineers followed in their footsteps on Sunday – with bottled oxygen and Sherpa support – to reach the highest point on earth at 8,849 meters.

2. May 20252. May 2025

Waiting for the first summit success of the spring season on Mount Everest

View of Mount Everest (l.) and Lhotse (from Namche) — View of Mount Everest (l.) and Lhotse (in fall 2019)

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 conditions on the highest mountain on earth have been rather difficult. But from this Saturday onwards, the weather is expected to be comparatively calm for the summit zone of Everest, with hardly any precipitation and relatively little wind.

21. March 202521. March 2025

World Day for Glaciers: Alarming signals also on Mount Everest

Glacier with water at Kokodak Dome in China — Glaciers are melting

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 the co-leaders of the study, categorized the figure. “The 273 billion tonnes of ice lost annually amounts to what the entire global population consumes in 30 years, assuming three litres per person and day,” said the glaciologist from Switzerland.

The dramatic state of the glaciers can be observed worldwide. For example in the Alps, which scientists predict will be largely free of glaciers by 2100. Or in the polar regions, where temperatures are rising even faster than the global average and where the supposedly “eternal ice” is melting away like an ice ball in a waffle on a hot summer’s day. And also the region around Mount Everest, the highest mountain on earth, is no exception.

4. March 20254. March 2025

China reopens Everest region

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 taking measurements for more than a month, have now declared the region safe again. No unusual ice falls, avalanches or geological changes had been observed by the end of February, said Ma Weiqiang, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

7. January 20258. January 2025

Jost Kobusch experienced earthquake in tent on Everest: “Everything shook”

Jost Kobusch - on the West Shoulder of Mount Everest on 27 December — Jost Kobusch – on the West Shoulder of Mount Everest on 27 December

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 everything was shaking.”

Kobusch had spent the night about halfway up on the way to Lho La. The pass connects the Everest Valley on the Nepalese south side with Tibet. This is where the West Ridge begins, over which Jost wants to climb Mount Everest in winter. After reaching an altitude of around 7,500 meters on his planned route on 27 December, this time he climbed “without any expectations”, says Kobusch. “I just wanted to feel what was possible. I had everything I needed to possibly climb higher.”

7. January 20257. January 2025

Strong earthquake in Tibet near Mount Everest

Approach to Mount Everest (center) through the Tibetan region of Tingri (in 2005)

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 on the Tibetan side. The epicenter was in the county of Tingri, around 80 kilometers north of Everest.

Tingri is the gateway for many mountaineers and trekking tourists making their way to the Tibetan north side of Mount Everest – or to the north side of the eight-thousander Cho Oyu.

In the Khumbu, the region on the Nepalese south side of Everest, the earth also shook. No major damage has been reported from there so far. The earth tremors were also felt in the capital Kathmandu, as well as in the neighboring countries of Bhutan and India.

11. October 202415. October 2024

100 years after disappearing on Mount Everest: Remains of Andrew Irvine discovered

“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 the Central Rongbuk Glacier at the foot of the North face of Mount Everest .

They found an old boot with a foot in it and the sock in question, which bore witness to who had once worn it. At the beginning of June 1924, the British mountaineers George Herbert Leigh Mallory, then 37 years old, and Andrew Comyn Irvine, 22 years old, had set off on a summit attempt on the then unclimbed Mount Everest. According to their expedition colleague Noell Odell, they were last seen on 8 June on the Northeast Ridge, after which their trail was lost. To this day, the mystery of how close they came to the highest point on earth at 8,849 meters is unsolved.

7. October 20247. October 2024

Summit success on Cho Oyu – the tenth eight-thousander for Anja Blacha

Now she’s in double figures. Last Saturday (5 October), Anja Blacha and Ngima Dorchi Sherpa scaled the 8,188-meter-high Cho Oyu via the Tibetan north side, her fourth eight-thousander this year – “Ngima with, me without a breathing mask,” as Anja writes to me. “It was a bit windy, but otherwise the conditions were great.”

For the 34-year-old German, it was the tenth of the 14 eight-thousanders, the ninth without bottled oxygen. “I know my body well enough by now to know how it reacts to altitude and that it can usually cope with it. So why not do without this aid if I can?,” Blacha wrote to me at the end of September after her summit success on Manaslu.

27. September 202427. September 2024

Anja Blacha after her Manaslu success: “I had the summit to myself”

After the eight-thousander is before the eight-thousander. This year, this also applies to Anja Blacha, who has now climbed nine of the 14 highest mountains in the world. This makes the 34-year-old the German woman with the most eight-thousander summit successes.

Last spring, she first scaled Makalu (8,485 meters) and then Kangchenjunga (8,586 meters), both without bottled oxygen. She also climbed without a breathing mask during her successful ascent on Manaslu (8,163 meters) on Monday. Now Blacha wants to try her hand at Cho Oyu (8,188 meters). She answered my questions in Tibet.

Anja, Manaslu was your third eight-thousander summit this year. How did you fare on your ascent?