How much do you know about Mount Everest? We start learning about Mount Everest from the moment we can understand speech. Through random sayings, news segments in the background about a disaster… it seems to always come up. But how much do you really know about Mount Everest?
The bodies of climbers David Lama, Hansjörg Auer and Jess Roskelley have been found. Trio was killed by an L3 avalanche.
The North Face climbers David Lama, Jess Roskelley and Hansjörg Auer are presumed dead after an avalanche in the Canadian Rockies.
We’ve received an abundance of emails asking if Pemba Gyalje Sherpa has died in a mountaineering accident. We are clarifying that as of 23 March 2019, Pemba Gyalje Sherpa is still alive.
On 09 March, the news was official. We had lost Tom Ballard on Nanga Parbat. In the days that followed, the world seemed just a little smaller. Worldwide, we had to come to terms with the idea that the growth, of what we expected to be, one of the greatest mountaineers was permanently stunted.
Fredrik Sträng announces he will try to summit K2 again in 2019. This expedition will be his fourth attempt to summit K2. He continues his partnership with Sigma technology for the expedition.
On 09 March, the search for Tom Ballard and his climbing partner, Daniele Nardi, was officially called off. The previous sightings of “silhouettes” during the reconnaissance operation were confirmed to be the bodies of the two climbers.
It is with heavy hearts that we announce that the search and rescue operation of Tom Ballard and Daniele Nardi was officially called off on 09 March 2019.
The rescue operation had been ongoing since the climbers’ last communication on 24 February. Both climbers were on an expedition attempting to climb the notorious Mummery Spur on Nanga Parbat in Pakistan. Since the route’s creation, it has remained unclimbed.
On 06 March, the Nardi team revealed that Alex Txikon had identified two “silhouettes” through a high powered telescope. The team was prepared to confirm the sightings using the assistance of a helicopter flyby. On the scheduled day, Pakistan recalled the helicopter for military operations. It would be another two days before the identification could be completed.
On 09 March, Ambassador Stefano Pontecorvo announced on Twitter that the “silhouettes” previously identified were, in fact, those of Tom Ballard and Daniele Nardi.
In a surprising update to the Daniele Nardi and Tom Ballard Rescue operation, Alex Txikon identifies two Silhouettes on Nanga Parbat from Base Camp. The search is continuing.
According to reports, the identification was made at dawn; and helicopters are scheduled to arrive soon to continue the exploration of the mountain. The report stated that the search would continue along the Mummery Spur route. The team hopes to get closer observations of images they witnessed through a telescope.
Over the weekend, the Daniele Nardi and Tom Ballard rescue operation was plagued by delays and bad weather. A rescue fund has been set up.
Charlotte Fox, a survivor of the 1996 Everest Disaster has died in her home from an apparent fall.
In March 2018, Dr. Ash Routen will be leading a two-man team to Siberia in an attempt to traverse Lake Baikal unassisted and unsupported.
Routen and his partner will be withstanding temperatures in excess of -40° C (-40° F).
In a controversial statement on Twitter, Vanessa O’Brien revealed that she felt the Nanga Parbat rescue volunteers could have climbed higher to retrieve Tomasz Mackiewicz.
On Friday, 26 January, Tomasz Mackiewicz and Elisabeth Revol made a successful assault on the summit of Nanga Parbat during their Winter Ascent Expedition. Prior to their attempt, Nanga Parbat had only been summited once in the winter in 2014.
“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.
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.
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.
Known Spanish climber Alberto Zerain and his climbing partner, Mariano Galvan from Argentina, have been reported as missing on Nanga Parbat.
Zerain’s team announced on 27, June, that communication with the climber had been lost on 24, June. According to a statement on their Twitter account, the team believes that because of the number of days the climbers have spent on the Mazeno route, they believe their radio equipment has lost battery.
Fredrik Sträng is our K2 2017 Watch Pick, and we will be following his expedition on K2 this year through his Dispatches from the mountain. But who is Fredrik Sträng and why does it matter? I felt that in order to really give readers a sense of what Fredrik Sträng is like as a climber and person, we needed some input from Cass Légér, the editor of BCM and Sträng’s point of contact for Dispatches. During my latest meeting with Cass, I lobbied for the quote bits below.
Here’s a glimpse into the life of this incredible climber, with some quotes from Cass Légér, with whom I spoke with this week while trying to get to know Sträng a bit better for this piece.
While western climbers are famed for their great feats, Sherpa climbers are some of the best, with a natural ability to weather high-altitude oxygen levels and an almost unnatural ability to climb relatively effortlessly compared to western climbers. These are 4 of the world’s greatest Sherpa climbers who are still alive.
Pemba Gyalje, Purba Tashi Sherpa, Ang Dorje, Lakpa Gelu
Mountaineer Fredrik Sträng heads out to K2 on June 12, 2017, after nearly ten years of absence from the mountain since the 2008 K2 Tragedy that killed 11 mountaineers.
On 3, June, Sträng was ready, packing his gear for his K2 expedition and gave everyone a glimpse of 60% of his gear, which he laid out and gave a tour of. His gear included the Swedish flag, two Petzl ice axes, Olympus Mons La Sportiva high-altitude boots, a Primus Lite XL stove pot and Out Meals dehydrated ready-to-eat meals.
Ueli Steck, one of the most revered mountaineers of his time, died on 30 April 2017 while on a Himalayan expedition on Mount Nuptse. He was 40 years old.
Enjoy the memory of Ueli Steck by watching the awe-inspiring videos that made one of the greatest mountaineers a household name:
Ueli Steck, one of the most revered mountaineers of his time, died on 30, April 2017 while on a Himalayan expedition on Mount Nuptse. He was 40 years old.
On 04, May 2017, Ueli Steck was given a ceremonious burial service in Khumjung, Nepal. The mountaineer was cremated, and in attendance were only close family and friends who mourned his death for over three hours. The ceremony took place in Tengboche Monastery in true Nepalese tradition. It was reported that some of his ashes were spread in Nepal, and the rest, taken to Switzerland to be dispersed by his family.
Ueli Steck’s life ended as the first casualty of the 2017 Everest Season. Steck died near the base of Nuptse at Camp 1 after falling 3,280 ft. (1000 m.). He had climbed the sister mountain of Everest to acclimate himself to the altitude before traversing Everest and Lhotse in May along with the rest of the mountaineering teams who make their summit assaults around 10 May.
Royal Robbins, a legendary rock climber who helped define the rules of engagement for the sport, dies on Tuesday, March 14, 2017, at the age of 82.
Born in 1935, Robbins grew up in Southern California much like most other working-class children spending segmented years between trailer parks before learning how to climb in the early 1950s. His first tackle was Tahquitz, a granite crag that includes nearly featureless sections across its routes and is notorious for loose rock on its North Side. His daring first run would be a testament to his audacious achievements in the future, which struck awe in his followers.
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