PAKISTAN – One climber has been rescued from Nanga Parbat and one perished during separate winter expeditions on the “Killer Mountain.”
French mountaineer Elisabeth Revol was rescued off of the mountain after an ill-fated storm trapped her and her climbing partner above 25,000 ft (7620 m).
Her climbing partner, Polish native Tomasz “Tomek” Mackiewicz had to be left behind due to his severe injuries and physical condition.
Greetings readers,
As you’ are all aware, Base Camp Magazine underwent a hiatus from November 22 until now in an effort to restructure our staff responsibilities and the future aim of our publication.
The mission of the 59th Antarctic Expedition is to study ice cores of exceptional age; the crew hopes to reach depths of ice that are older than previously recorded as having been studied. In 2007, a Japanese mission took samples from ice cores that aged around 720,000-years-old; the team studied them in their Dome Fuji Station located in inland Antarctica. These cores were located at a depth of 3,035 meters.
Meet Second Lieutenant Scott Sears. Scott is going solo, unsupported and unassisted to the South Pole this November, effectively making him the youngest man to ever reach it unsupported if he succeeds.
Scott is sponsored by Juice Plus, Shackleton and other great brands.
Now, we’re moving into our Antarctica and Cold-Environment Expedition Season. This is where we feature climbers, explorers and expeditions traveling to Antarctica and other environments that are naturally cold year-round.
We have a lot planned for this long season that will stretch into the end of winter 2017. Included in our publication calendar is our well-awaited coverage of Second Lieutenant Scott Sears’ solo expedition to the South Pole and a feature on Dr. Ash Routen’s expedition to Lake Baikal in Siberia where he will be leading a team of 3 Brits across one of the world’s most interesting bodies of water.
“Certain that Bob had me, I unclipped from the anchors, leaned back – and then free-fell nearly 200 feet to the ground.” I kept telling myself, “Don’t close your eyes Wendy, don’t close your eyes.”
Wendy Ong is the only person to have fallen nearly 200 feet (70m), survive, go on to rock climb, ice-climb, and ski at high levels with a T-10 Spinal Cord Injury; survive sepsis and climb her hardest trad route as a paraplegic (5.12- Cloud Tower, Red Rocks, Nevada) a few months later; ski her way across North America; and be the only para to ski, ice-climb, and rock climb in the space of less than ten days.
Ben Eielson Jr./Sr. High School’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) took on mountaineering in a recent training course designed to teach basic mountaineering concepts and techniques.
After the expedition, work on accepting that the expedition is over. The team is back home, the season has ended and you need to get back to your life and responsibilities.
After a what seemed like a disappointing turn of events on K2, Fredrik Sträng veers course and summits Broad Peak, salvaging some of his K2 2017 expedition.
The 2017 K2 season is over. Only one expedition made it all the way to the summit, however, Fredrik Sträng vows to try again next year.
Fredrik endured a series of setbacks on K2, the weather being the most challenging adversary for this master climber. Communication was also down during the last few days of his expedition.
There hasn’t been a successful summit on the King of Mountains, K2, since 2014. However, this changed today when one expedition, led by Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, made it to the summit and reported their successful assault through social media.
Roughly six hours ago, Mingma G., head of Dreamers Destination, reported on his Facebook page that he and 11 other climbers had successfully made it to the summit. He wrote:
On 28 July, Fredrik returned to Base Camp after aborting the ascent at aprox. 7,400 meters due to bad weather and dangerous conditions that included little visibility, waist-deep snow and avalanches.
On 28 July at 8:00 P.M. EST, Fredrik’s contact updated his progress by stating that Fredrik and his partner would attempt the summit again. He will now approach the summit via the Cescen Route due to “bad conditions on Abruzzi.”
Earlier this month, we had a “FIREPOT” night and our Social Media manager, Rob, joined me for a tasting two of Outdoorfood’s dehydrated meals, their award winning Porcini Mushroom Risotto and their highest calorie meal, Orzo Pasta Bolognese.
“The beef had an abundance of flavor, each bite of it was rewarding. The meal had real bits of tomato in it that also provided real flavor.”
Yesterday, he announced that today is the day for the summit bid start!
We, and all you reading this now, have been keeping our fingers crossed in hopes of good weather for the summit attempt for Fredrik Sträng’s Sigma K2017 Expedition. In our last Dispatch, we left Fredrik waiting patiently as he watched the stars and contemplated his place amongst them and measured his size against the mountain.
Through Dispatches, you’ve had an inside look into the Sigma K2 2017 Expedition that is underway with climbers Fredrik Sträng from Sweden, Ali Musa from Pakistan and their third team member, Abass, their Chef Cook at K2 Base Camp.
Next week, he and Ali Musa are expecting to have a chance at a summit push on K2, but it will most likely be a shared effort between them and other expeditions on the mountain.
While traditional mountaineering goals would take to long to complete for inclusion in the Winter Olympic Games, Ski mountaineering, on the other hand, is not; and the International Olympic Committee Executive Board announced this week that they would be including ski mountaineering in the 2020 Winter Youth Olympic Games Lausanne.
Keeping with our promise to bring you our review of an outdoor food brand many are calling exceptional, this week is FIREPOT week at Base Camp Magazine. We’re tasting 5 flavors from FIREPOT by Outdoorfood and will determine what they taste like hot, cold, cooked via the pan method and cooked via the pouch method.
First, we’d like to thank FIREPOT by Outdoorfood and John Fisher for trusting Base Camp Magazine with their products and allowing us the opportunity to taste them and present them to our readers. We received 5 samples from John Fisher, the founder of FIREPOT, based in Dorset, UK.
In this Editor’s Note, we will be giving you a glimpse into the life of what we like to call our “fearless editor,” Cass Légér; an editor who is always on-call, never sleeps and puts everything into this publication, making sure our bases are covered.
We sat down with the editor and asked a few of the following personal and business related questions that came from the staff and readers over the course of 5 months.
Moving on from Camp 1 after breakfast in his tent this morning, Fredrik Sträng commences the climb to Camp 2 and beyond.
Still snowing each day since his arrival on K2, Fredrik Sträng has made the best of the weather and window opportunities afforded to him on the mountain, always keeping physically active and exercising his mental capacities to remain in top shape for the summit.
This article was shared from Northeast Alpine Start a mountaineering tip/tutorial and product review publication.
Continuing my almost weekly Tuesday (not always Tuesday) Tech Tip series this week I’m sharing how to build the Auto-Locking Munter (ALM) hitch. In last weeks post I shared how to tie a Munter Hitch (MH) directly onto a carabiner, a skill useful for any climber. This skill is a little more specialized and its…
Beloved Spanish alpinist Alberto Zerain died in a tragic avalanche on Nanga Parbat this week. Though he was not able to return from the mountain in this life, his memory has found a new home in the hearts among those who appreciated his attitude toward the dare of a summit and those who admired his accomplishments.
Zerain was climbing Nanga Parbat as part of the 2x14x8000 project, which aimed to see 14 of the world’s 8,000 m. peaks climbed twice. While on the Mazeno Ridge, Zerain gave his last update to the Base Camp team on 24, June. Shortly after, his team lost contact with him and would announce on 27, June, that they believed he and Mariano Galvan had lost power on their radio communicators.
Getting over a sore neck, traversing unnaturally wet snow and finally getting a taste of Camp 1, Fredrik Sträng’s K2 2017 Expedition has turned out to be eventful early on, but plans are still on track for the summit.
Swedish climber Fredrik Sträng finally reaches K2 on Tuesday 27, June at approximately 6:50 pm local time.
Sträng shared an image of himself posing at Broad Peak Base Camp with a view of K2 in the distance on his Facebook Page. According to his reports, many teams have gathered in the area for their expeditions to K2 and Brad Peak this season.
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