Annapurna Summit Push Is On; Conditions Remain Tough
"I have always regarded this mountain as the most beautiful 8,000m climb and also the hardest," admits 38-year-old Mingma G. However, the poor state of the route this year, with sheer ice and lots of open crevasses from Camp 2 upward, forced his team to retreat twice when they ran out of rope. "This [is] my last expedition to Annapurna," he writes.
Imagine Nepal is not alone on the mountain. A large number of climbers from several teams are following closely behind.
Mingma remains concerned.
"This mountain is just too risky in between Camp 2 and Camp 3," he says. "I hope our team and all climbers on Annapurna have good weather on April 5 to the summit and back."
The mountain has already had one accident when Vadim Druelle of France fell some 40m into a crevasse. He was rescued, injured and frostbitten, by Mingmar Dhondup and Pasang Nurbu Sherpa, guides with 14 Peaks Expedition. Like other climbers, Druelle was acclimatizing before the summit push. Eduard Kubatov of Kyrgyzstan was with him the day before the accident and noted that the area was unsafe, but says Druelle chose to remain. Kubatov shared a video of Druelle's evacuation by helicopter:
Yesterday, a large number of climbers left Base Camp and started toward the summit. All seem to be aiming for Monday as summit day.
Seven Summit Treks has the largest group. They plan to advance one camp a day, starting today.
Mindaugas Satkauskas, a member of the 14 Peaks Expedition team, should be in Camp 2 now, he said before leaving. He plans to sleep in Camp 3 tomorrow and set off on the final summit push on Sunday at 5 pm local time.
Makalu Adventure reports that their team will start the summit push on April 6.
The Pioneer Adventure team, led by Mingma Dorchi Sherpa, is also on the go and likewise estimates April 6-8 as their summit days.
Gian Luca Cavalli of Italy and Cesar Rosales of Peru also left Base Camp yesterday. Contrary to their original plans, which included opening a variation up the Northwest Spur, they have noted that they will climb the normal route.
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National Geographic
21 hours ago
- National Geographic
Can this Sherpa change mountain climbing forever?
Still just a teenager, Nima Rinji Sherpa has big plans for the future: He recently partnered with the United Nations Development Programme, signed a book deal, and incorporated a company to make souvenirs out of trash removed from Everest. Photograph by Krystle Wright Last October, a slender 18-year-old Sherpa climber stood atop a snowy peak in Tibet and recorded a selfie video in the dark. It was 6:05 a.m., and with this summit of a mountain called Shishapangma, Nima Rinji Sherpa had topped all 14 of the world's 8,000-meter peaks, becoming the youngest person ever to do so. Like several international climbers who reached the peak that morning, he also had support: Nima had been led by a Sherpa guide. Breathless in the thin air and wearing a puffy down suit, Nima thanked his mom for praying for him and his dad for funding his expeditions. He alluded to the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza and asked for an end to war, hate, and racism. 'As a teenager, this is my message to each and every one of you,' he panted, then shouted, 'Woo-hoo!' Once he descended, Nima texted the video to his manager in Mumbai, who spliced it into an Instagram reel with inspirational music and blasted it to Nima's then 20,000 followers. Reporters called for interviews and shared the feel-good story of the teenager climbing under the banner #sherpapower to spread the message that his people weren't just supporters of Western climbers but athletes in their own right. Sherpas have long been associated with the hard but unglamorous aspects of climbing, like hauling loads and fixing lines. Nima has a different goal: becoming a global superstar. Photograph by Dina Litovsky Much of this scenario would have been improbable even one generation ago. For nearly 120 years, Sherpas have served as porters and guides for foreign climbers seeking glory on the world's highest peaks, becoming so synonymous with this work that many Westerners don't know that the word 'Sherpa' is an ethnicity, not a profession. But in the past 15 years, Sherpas have founded industry-leading guiding outfits and pursued their own world records and first ascents. Nima sits on the cusp of the next evolution: a Sherpa looking to eschew the business of guiding altogether and become a professional climbing star. (Superpowers are real—the resilience of Sherpas is proof.) Two months after setting his record, Nima was already preparing for his next project. Alongside famed Italian alpinist Simone Moro, he was attempting a winter ascent of 8,163-meter Manaslu. If they succeeded, the duo claimed, it would be the first winter climb of an 8,000-meter peak in pure alpine style, meaning in a single push, with none of the established camps, fixed ropes, bottled oxygen, or Sherpa support that Nima enjoyed on the 14 peaks. Even Moro, who at 57 had summited more eight-thousanders in the winter than anyone else, had never done so in pure alpine style. Expeditions like this are out of reach for most climbers from one of South Asia's poorest countries, but Nima is uniquely set up for them. His father, Tashi Lakpa Sherpa, and uncles are the founders of one of Nepal's largest guiding company, Seven Summit Treks. (The brothers also own an outfitter named 14 Peaks Expeditions, which Tashi oversees; a helicopter company called Heli Everest; and stakes in various other businesses.) Thanks to his dad's wealth, Nima never had to grind on the mountain, guiding or schlepping Westerners' gear as other Sherpas do. Even Moro's mentorship came through family connections; the alpinist works for the brothers as a helicopter pilot. (How an all-Nepali team pulled off one of the most dangerous climbs in history.) A few days before Nima departed, we met for breakfast at the Aloft hotel in Kathmandu where his father puts up clients and which serves as Seven Summit's de facto headquarters. Bearing the hallmarks of adolescence—a light mustache, clean Air Jordans, and earnest enthusiasm—Nima sipped a cappuccino while dishing sound bites at double speed. Eloquent and private-school educated, Nima knew his lines. 'I only want to do projects that are meaningful,' he said, because 'we're going to pass away someday. We have a very limited time.' The winter expedition would be a major step up from what he'd done, involving breathtaking cold and hurricane-level winds that could pin climbers in their tents for days. But Nima was undaunted. He fancied himself more an explorer than a climber, and 'winter climbing is more like exploration,' he declared, having never done a winter climb. 'It's more for me.' Historically, the chance of success for any winter 8,000-meter expedition is low, just 15 percent, according to Moro. So Nima added a disclaimer. 'Even if we don't reach summit, it's a learning for us.' It would be better if they summited, though. Nima wants to be a professional climber, meaning one sponsored by brands like The North Face and Red Bull. But his 14-peaks record hasn't been enough to earn those endorsements, so Manaslu is a chance to build his résumé. Nima joked that he needs a sponsor so that he doesn't 'bankrupt' his dad. But sponsorship isn't about the money. It's about dignity, he said. Sherpa climbers, he continued, 'never had the privilege to get chosen. The day I make the team, the day people consider me a professional athlete, it brings value.' For all the upward mobility that Sherpas have recently enjoyed, they have yet to make the leap from being guides who climb in their off-hours to athletes being paid to chase their own dreams. In aiming to be the first, Nima hopes to earn a measure of respect and equality that his people have long been due. But to grasp the opportunity before him, he'll have to transcend the world of commercial climbing that has both elevated and circumscribed his community for generations. Last winter, Nima and Italian alpinist Simone Moro climbed Nepal's Ama Dablam, a 22,349-foot peak known as the Matterhorn of the Himalaya, to acclimatize for an alpine-style push on 26,781-foot Manaslu. Photograph by OSWALD RODRIGO PEREIRA The idea of paying someone to guide you up a peak because you lack the ability to climb it independently is a relatively new one in the history of Himalayan mountaineering. For most of the 20th century, only explorers and serious climbers attempted peaks that rose above 8,000 meters, into the so-called death zone where there's insufficient oxygen to support human life. But in 1985, a wealthy Texas businessman named Dick Bass was led to the top of Everest by a climbing phenom named David Breashears, sparking the imaginations of amateur climbers worldwide: If he can do it, so can I. The commercial climbing industry was born. From the 1990s through the aughts, Western companies dominated the booming guiding business on Everest, charging up to $75,000 to climb the world's highest peak. They employed Sherpas and subcontracted logistics, like Base Camp setup and rope fixing, to Nepali companies, but the foreign guides owned the customer-facing outfitters and made the majority of the money. Some young Sherpas working on Everest saw an opportunity. Among them were Nima's father, Tashi Lakpa Sherpa, and three of his five brothers, Mingma, Chhang Dawa (who goes by Dawa), and Pasang Phurba. (Want to climb Mount Everest? Here's what you need to know.) The brothers grew up in a remote village with no electricity or running water, in view of 8,485-meter Makalu peak. Their childhood was one that Tashi now compares to the show Man Vs. Wild. They lived in the jungle, herding the family's yaks, sheep, and cows. They slept in shelters built from plastic tarps and hunted small animals for food. Sometimes they heard no other human voices for months. But the boys grew up proud. Their herds made them wealthy by the subsistence standards of the village. There were no mountaineers in the family. The brothers learned on the radio about climbing Sherpas like Ang Rita Sherpa, who was nicknamed the Snow Leopard and climbed Everest 10 times without bottled oxygen. 'He is Sherpa, I am also Sherpa. Why can't I do this?' Dawa recalled thinking. Mingma, the second oldest brother, went to Kathmandu at 14 and found a job hauling 75-pound loads as a trekking porter, then worked his way up to climbing with clients. Once he gained enough experience to fix ropes on 8,000-meter peaks—a job reserved for the strongest and most skilled Sherpas—he sent for his brothers. Tashi, the second youngest, began climbing Everest at 18. He crossed the deadly Khumbu Icefall 20 to 30 times an expedition, he told me, experiencing mortal fear each time. 'Every day, every second, life is in danger,' he said. Nima's father, Tashi Lakpa Sherpa (right), co-founded Seven Summit Treks, one of Nepal's largest guiding company, and he knows the dangers of mountaineering firsthand—he's climbed Everest nine times. Still, he says, Nima has 'a totally different opportunity for the Sherpa community.' Photograph by Krystle Wright But Mingma and Dawa, the brawny big brothers, were particularly irked by their unofficial job title. 'The Western people say we are porters,' said Dawa. 'This is not fair,' said Mingma. In their eyes, they were doing the same work as foreign guides, climbing the same mountains as clients. Why were they porters, and the Westerners guides and climbers? 'That's why we have to show something,' said Dawa. To prove that they had the skills to rival the world's best guides, Mingma and Dawa decided to climb all the 8,000-meter peaks. At the time, only the most dedicated mountaineers climbed all 14, and Mingma was the first Nepali to do so. The accomplishment gave the brothers major credibility, and inspired an idea. They would start their own company—and cut out the middleman. In 2010, they launched Seven Summit Treks, charging just $30,000 per person to climb Everest. Other Sherpa-led businesses followed, and over the next several years these companies outcompeted the old guard, benefiting from the ability to set lower prices as well as various upheavals in the climbing industry, as journalist Will Cockrell chronicled in his book, Everest, Inc. By 2019, Cockrell reported, Seven Summit was the largest taxpayer in Nepal's trekking and guiding industry. Today, Himalayan climbing archivist Billi Bierling calls Sherpas the 'bosses on the mountain,' estimating that they own 80 to 85 percent of the expedition market. While Sherpas of this generation were taking control of their industry, some were also falling in love with climbing, a sport most of their forebears saw as only a job; and slowly building visibility. By 2015, Sherpa climbers were making first ascents sans clients and promoting their feats on social media. In 2018, a Sherpa named Dawa Yangzum was sponsored by The North Face, albeit for guiding; she was the first Nepali woman to earn a certification from the International Federation of Mountain Guides Associations. But the trend was turbocharged in 2019, when a Nepali British former special forces soldier, Nirmal 'Nims' Purja, climbed the 14 peaks in record time, using helicopters, bottled oxygen, and fixed ropes to accomplish in six months what had previously taken Korean climber Kim Chang-Ho nearly eight years to do (though Kim climbed without supplemental oxygen and kayaked and cycled to Everest Base Camp). Nims, who is not Sherpa, brought handheld cameras and broadcast his journey on Instagram, capturing footage that became a hit 2021 Netflix documentary. He leveraged his exploits to start his own guiding business and sign deals with Red Bull, Nike, and Bremont watches, and though his career is now plagued by accusations of sexual misconduct (which he's denied), he put the world on notice that when Nepalis didn't have to serve clients, they could be recognized as world-class climbers in their own right. (Meet the Sherpa bringing Wi-Fi to Everest.) Nima comes of age in these flush times, blessed with not just family money but also role models and next-level ambitions. Growing up in Kathmandu, Nima began telling his father in early adolescence that he wanted to become a professional athlete. 'The plan was always to do something big in life,' Nima said. 'It was always the plan.' Nima poses with Kami Rita Sherpa after the latter's 29th summit of Everest. Photograph by Manish Maharjan The lead-up to a major objective tends to be an ascetic time for athletes, when they retreat from the world and prepare. But Nima is trying to capitalize on his moment, and he kept a frenetic schedule in the few days before Manaslu, attending to small-time obligations ranging from a cricket game for the Nepal Premier League to an interview for an American friend's YouTube channel and an elaborate 20-person lunch with Jane Goodall. Nima's manager at the time, Asad Abid, was frustrated. He thought Nima was sinking too much time, for free, into engagements that didn't move him toward his ultimate goal, which is to get paid to climb by brands. Some companies have offered free gear, Abid said, 'but nobody's talking money.' The outdoor industry is dominated by Western brands, and Sherpas face racial and language differences that can make it difficult to secure endorsements. They also have to contend with a cultural and vocational challenge. The Sherpa community venerates climbers who have summited Everest 20 times or set records like Nima's, but climbing brands don't usually sponsor mountaineers who ply trade routes on fixed ropes in the commercial style, whether they're the Sherpa guides on those expeditions or the climbers who pay those guides and use bottled oxygen, as Nima did. Most professional climbers are instead alpinists, who are self-supported and travel light and fast. To inspire the climbing cognoscenti, and eventually earn sponsorships, an athlete must climb new routes or peaks in good style, meaning without bottled oxygen or fixed ropes—and achieve an ineffable X factor that can be hard to grasp for those born outside of alpinism's Eurocentric culture. 'You need to have been living and breathing climbing as a sport from a young age to understand what is considered an accomplishment,' Cockrell says. It's a daunting transition even for the most well-resourced young Sherpa, which is why Moro told me he felt the urgency to 'grab' the teen, as he put it, and mentor him, 'before he falls into the trap of becoming another famous 8,000-meter-peak collector.' In inviting Nima to Manaslu, Moro hoped both to teach skills and instill the kind of worldview he said Nima will need to make it as a professional adventurer. The leap that Nima needs to make from commercial mountaineering to alpinism could be years long. He'll have to learn skills like ice climbing and placing gear, alpinist and former North Face team manager Conrad Anker told me. He'll also likely have to travel to North America or Europe to train on rock and ice, as it takes days to approach most peaks in Nepal. And he'll have to develop an eye for identifying his own projects. But in the age of the athlete-influencer, there may be a different way for Nima, one modeled by Nepali climbers like Nims. Climbing purists said that Nims's feat was primarily one of logistics and marketing—he achieved a speed record he essentially invented, one utilizing every accoutrement from helicopters to bottled oxygen—yet he nonetheless circumvented the traditional path to stardom. Nima, too, seems to be betting on this model of building his brand alongside his bona fides. 'Climbing both [Everest and Lhotse] on the same day,' he wrote in April 2024 on Instagram, 'is almost unheard of, and I found myself doing it as the mountain spirits guided me.' Still, storytelling can go only so far. Nims's record was paradigm shifting, and the long process through which Dawa Yangzum obtained her IFMGA certification is widely respected in climbing. Nima may be able to find his own path to professional climbing. But if you want to climb for a brand like The North Face, Anker says, you have to 'climb hard.' (You can still climb Mount Everest. Here's how to do it responsibly.) As with many prodigies, it's hard to tell how much of Nima's ambition is innate versus inherited, the result of some subtle parental prodding. As Tashi drove Nima and me around Kathmandu in his leather-lined SUV one afternoon, the two took turns telling Nima's origin story, passing the ball to one another smoothly in the front seats. Tashi's support of Nima has been tireless and unconditional. When Nima wanted to become a professional soccer player, Tashi tried to link him up with an elite coach. When that fizzled, he took his son to the climbing gym. When Nima wanted to become a photographer, he took him trekking to shoot photos. Tashi, who at 39 wore thick-framed black glasses and a stylish fade, said, 'I bought, like, a Sony A7?' 'Sony A7, yeah,' Nima agreed with a chuckle, from the passenger seat. 'A Sony A7 for him, and several lenses,' Tashi continued. 'Then I took him to Kongma La Pass, right?' This is a multiday trek in Nepal. 'Just the two of us, yeah.' 'Just him and me,' Tashi agreed. 'I saw that he's very strong.' It was on this trek, when Nima was 15, that Tashi suggested it might be 'interesting,' as Nima recalled it, for him to climb the 14 peaks as a teenager. Nima went home and did his research, then told his dad, Let's do it. The father's idea had become the son's. Initially, the 14-peaks project was a creative, mostly selfish endeavor: Inspired by Asian American adventure photographer and National Geographic Explorer Jimmy Chin, Nima wanted to produce a documentary. But on his first climb, Manaslu, in September 2022, he saw something surprising. He never knew much about the family business, and had always assumed his father's clients must be elite-level athletes to climb big mountains. Now he saw that in fact, many of them were average, even slow. Meanwhile Sherpas outpaced everybody and carried their loads. Seeing their raw talent, he began to wonder why there was no world-famous Sherpa climber today. Thanks to his father's connections, Nima (right) never had to make a living hauling gear and supplies on the steep trails leading to the high peaks. Photograph by Krystle Wright His motivation was galvanized, however, on his first trip to Shishapangma, a year before he'd ultimately summit. It was October 7, 2023, and Nima was at Base Camp. A Seven Summit Sherpa named Tenjen 'Lama' Sherpa, whom Nima had grown close to, was also on the mountain, assisting climber Gina Rzucidlo as she attempted to become the first American woman to summit the 14 peaks. Another American, Anna Gutu, was also targeting her 14th peak the same day. On their summit push, Gutu and her partner were killed in an avalanche. Lama and Rzucidlo were just below the summit, and Nima radioed to advise that they descend. But Rzucidlo wanted to continue, and shortly after, a second avalanche claimed both her and Lama's lives. Nima was in shock. Lama had come to feel like one of his guardian angels on the mountain. Afterward, he was depressed for months. 'I just felt very demotivated,' he said. 'Not just in climbing. In life itself.' It was during this time that he began to use the hashtag 'sherpapower.' He realized he wanted to be a voice for the Sherpa community. He wanted his people to feel that their lives had value beyond the measure of their wages. 'Let's say they make $4,000 a summit,' he said. 'I don't know if there's any job where you get paid this and it's so risky.' Sherpas 'literally feel' for their clients, he told me pointedly, sacrificing their own safety and even lives to help them summit. This kind of courage and loyalty, he said, 'is not something money can buy.' They deserved for their stories to be told, he thought—to be honored like heroes, not just paid like help. Over the years, Tashi has witnessed the death of many Sherpas like Lama, which is why he always told his own son that if he were to climb, he'd climb as an athlete, not a guide. If Nima was going to risk it all, he would risk it for his own dreams. Nima's climbing was nonetheless extremely stressful for Tashi and his wife, Leema. Tashi says he hid his worry—he didn't want to affect Nima's decision-making in the mountains—but behind the scenes he spun a protective web. He assigned one of his ace guides, Pasang Nurbu Sherpa, as Nima's climbing partner; he kept helicopters on standby while they climbed; he cut clients deals to beef up the man power on Nima's expeditions. On summit days, he didn't sleep, refreshing Nima's GPS tracker every 10 minutes. Whenever Tashi thought about calling his son back, he reminded himself, We are on a mission. (That's the word he uses, 'we.') 'I want to make him a super climber, super athlete,' he said. 'So I manage my emotions.' Tashi also wanted to shield Nima from another fraught aspect of the guiding business. Especially in its early years, Seven Summit was criticized for its safety record, and some said the company brought dangerously inexperienced guides and climbers onto the mountains. (The brothers acknowledged some growing pains but said they recruited many new Sherpas to the industry who are now trained and experienced, and train clients on lower peaks before they climb eight-thousanders.) In channeling Nima toward a different path, Tashi hoped to keep his son from the controversy that's dogged him and his family. 'He can have another type of job and professionalism as an athlete,' he said. Of course, Tashi could have encouraged his son to pursue a profession outside of climbing, as many Sherpas have urged their children to do. Any 8,000-meter peak can kill you, and the dangers are magnified in the winter, when temperatures plummet and avalanche risk increases. Going in alpine style removes the added security of fixed lines and bottled oxygen. The first time Moro attempted a winter alpine-style 8,000-meter ascent, an avalanche killed both his climbing partners. I asked Tashi what he'd say to parents who wonder how he can not only let his son do something so dangerous but also fund it. 'I think'—he said, pausing thoughtfully—'creating history is not normal. It's not simple.' Abid, Nima's former manager, offered his theory. 'I think Tashi is living vicariously through Nima,' he said. But when you're a parent whose life story is entangled within a generations-long struggle for equality, your children may serve as a proxy for more than your own unrealized ambitions. Tashi has seen so many strong Sherpa boys working for the glory of others, he told me, so much of his people's talent hired away. He always wanted to see one of those young athletes climb unencumbered. 'This is a totally different opportunity for the Sherpa community,' he said, 'and I really want to send my son in this way.' Annapurna was the first of all the eight-thousanders to be climbed, but it's also one of the deadliest— for every three climbers who stand on the summit, one will die trying to get there. Nima reached the peak in the spring of 2024 without the use of supplemental oxygen. Photograph by Manish Maharjan In Kathmandu in December, you can be seduced into believing winter won't kill you. The day that Nima left for his climb was like all the other days before it: sunny and mild, the smog-filled sky a dingy blue. I boarded an orange Heli Everest chopper with Nima, Moro, and Polish filmmaker Oswald Rodrigo Pereira, 40, their climbing partner. The plan was to fly into the Everest valley and trek five days to the Base Camp of Ama Dablam, a technical, 6,812-meter peak known as the Matterhorn of the Himalaya, where I'd catch a heli ride back. They'd climb Ama Dablam to acclimatize, then fly out to the Manaslu valley. The helicopter soared over green hills rippled with farming terraces, carved from the mountain like stadium steps. Snowcapped peaks lined the horizon, each big and beautiful enough to anchor a national park on its own. This was awe-inspiring stuff for most people, but for Nima, it was a commute. He'd fallen asleep. During the past few days in Kathmandu, I'd witnessed the muscle of Seven Summit firsthand. Everywhere I went, I bumped into smiling, clean-faced young men wearing company puffies and ball caps. Nima was cocooned within this universe, chauffeured and flanked constantly by the Sherpas in his father's employ. Does Nima fully understand what achieving his dream would require, from the hard work to the risktaking it would demand? He says he does, but for all his precociousness, here was an 18-year-old who still compared climbing to the epic adventures out of his favorite fantasy books. 'Winter expedition is like Lord of the Rings,' he said with exuberance, or 'When you read Harry Potter, it makes you excited. I feel like I'm in that life right now.' In both these stories, a hero—a chosen one—goes on a quest to save the people he loves. Harry Potter is destined by prophecy to save wizardkind; Frodo carries the Ring to save Middle Earth. Nima, too, sees himself as a messenger for his community. 'I think at the young age that he is, he already has a big burden on him, that he also imposes on himself,' Pereira later told me. In the helicopter, Nima woke up. We were wearing soundproof headsets, so he used his iPhone camera to show me Everest, zooming in on the snow-covered pyramid. Then he opened his notepad and typed me a message: 'The prince returns to the mountains.' Nima's first noncommercial expedition began smoothly, with days of dry weather on Ama Dablam. Nima, Moro, and Pereira enjoyed two easy rotations—acclimatization trips—up to Camps I and II. But the night before their summit bid, it snowed. With the rocks now slick, the climbers had to brace more often against fixed ropes, and on the second day, Nima's hands and forearms began to cramp. The trio decided to turn around several hundred feet below the summit and move on to Manaslu with less acclimatization than they'd hoped. After they reached Manaslu Base Camp a week and a half later, it snowed again. Then the forecast deteriorated further: three straight weeks of winds projected at over 90 miles an hour, creating dangerous climbing conditions. If they waited, they'd lose what acclimatization they had. After a week at Base Camp, they canceled the expedition. Nima and Moro immediately planned another attempt on Manaslu next winter. 'I felt like this was the best expedition of my life,' Nima told me. The extreme conditions exhilarated him, and compared to commercial expeditions, 'everything was in our hands.' Nima's greatest challenge now may be to stay focused on climbing. After Manaslu, he once again has a lot going on. He recently signed a book deal and announced that he's a climate influencer for the United Nations Development Programme in Nepal. In the spring he went to Everest Base Camp, but not to climb—he was helping his dad manage logistics, sitting for interviews with an American news crew, and assisting a company that was experimentally using drones to haul trash off the mountain. He'd also incorporated a company of his own, to make souvenirs from all that trash. He was training for Manaslu, he told me, but he was vague about how much, saying that he was trail running and strength training but didn't track his workouts. It remains to be seen if Nima will be the breakthrough athlete he wants to be. He has his doubters. His privilege is a source of ire among some in his own community, and several people I interviewed wanted me to know that Nepal has many talented young climbers today, not just Nima—climbers who would have his profile if they had his opportunities. But Nima believes that whether he achieves his goal or not, he's done something for his community already. (When climbing the world's tallest mountains, what counts as cheating?) On our trek's fourth day, I asked him what he thought of the debate about his climbing style. The sun was sinking below the mountains, and we were in a chilly room of a rustic lodge in the Sherpa village of Deboche. Was he aware that some people dismissed climbing 8,000-meter peaks as he did, with oxygen and fixed lines and Sherpa support? That people suggested that, in the eyes of 'real climbers,' he had yet to achieve much? Nima was sitting in a chair with his arms crossed. He didn't even pause. He said he didn't think those criticisms applied to him, then laughed. If he was a grown man making a big deal out of his accomplishments, they might have a point. 'But I'm just 16, 17 years old, just figuring it out,' he said, reminding me how young he was when he started climbing in the high peaks, so give him a break. Nima knows that what he did was impressive at his age. He understands that the story of Sherpas in the past 15 years has been one of the power of role-modeling, of being able to see heroes made in your own image and then daring to imagine yourself surpassing them. He believes he moved the right people. 'If I was someone else and I saw an 18-year-old did this,' he said, 'I'd be inspired.' A version of this story will appear in the November 2025 issue of National Geographic magazine.
Yahoo
05-06-2025
- Yahoo
Kangchenjunga: The Season's Last Summits?
Everest is not the only 8,000'er where time is running out; many climbers are betting on "now or never" pushes on Kangchenjunga. Today, teams are reporting several summits, including 10 members of Mingma G's Imagine Nepal expedition. Amongst them, Naila Kiani of Pakistan bagged her 12th 8,000'er and fellow Pakistani Sirbaz Khan summited the peak again, just days after completing his no-oxygen 14x8,000'er quest. This time, Khan used supplemental oxygen because he was guiding, leader Mingma G told ExplorersWeb from Advanced Base Camp. Other members of the summit group included Sashko Kedev of Macedonia (on his 13th 8,000'er with only Gasherbrum I to go), Wang Zhong of China, Hakon Asvang of Norway, and Maria Alexandra Danila of Romania. The guides included Khan, Pemba Chhiri Sherpa, Ngima Nuru Sherpa, Kili Pemba Sherpa, and Prem Bahadur Tamang. Imagine Nepal's team will try to return to Advanced Base Camp today. At the time of writing (2:45 pm, Nepal time), they were near Camp 2. Australian Allie Pepper is attempting to reach the summit without oxygen, she is supported by Mikel Sherpa. Earlier today, Pepper left Camp 3 at 6,800m and is slowly ascending. At 2:30 pm, her tracker put her at 7,350m, still far from the 8,586m summit. As with Everest, teams have gained altitude gradually from camp to camp -- a strategy now possible with the large supplies of O2 -- and have launched summit pushes when the weather allowed over the last seven days. As on Everest, there were many summits on May 18, with teams taking advantage of relatively light winds at summit altitude. For now, there is little information about those ascending or descending on Kangchenjunga. The descent is a serious challenge; Kangchenjunga is not only the third highest mountain on Earth, but the normal route is very long, longer even than the normal route on K2. It is an exhausting climb to the summit, but climbers need to save enough power for a descent involving steep sections and long plateau traverses. The mountain has already taken a climber's life. On May 11, Margareta Morin of France died on her first 8,000m climb. Meanwhile, British climber Adrian Hayes was injured while descending and spent a night above 8,000m in the open. He eventually made it down and rescue services airlifted him to hospital for treatment.
Yahoo
28-05-2025
- Yahoo
Climber Scales Mount Everest Four Times In 15 Days
An astonishing world record was set earlier this month in Nepal after a climber named Tashi Gyalzen Sherpa climbed to the summit of Mount Everest a record-breaking four times in just fifteen days, accomplishing a feet of physical and mental endurance unparalleled in the history of mountaineering. It would be difficult to overstate just how impressive Sherpa's feat was. Ascending 29,032 feet to the height of the towering mountain, where the oxygen is gaspingly thin and the weather perilously treacherous is, for many, the highlight of their climbing lives. To go up and down repeatedly, allowing one's body to adjust to the difference in oxygen at various levels, is almost incomprehensible. Yet the 29-year-old, who hails from a small Nepali town called Phortse, managed to achieve what seemed unachievable. Tashi started working as a climbing guide in 2017. Two years later, in 2019, he ascended to Everest's summit for the first time. In the years since, he reached the peak four times: three from the Nepal side, and once from the Tibetan side. This year, things were different. His first ascent occurred on May 9, when he was part of a rope-fixing team laying the route for the 8K Expedition. After that, Tashi quickly went up a second time (in reflecting, he told reporters that the second climb was the easiest). Finally, after ascending a third time while assisting a client, Tashi quickly scaled the mountain solo for his fourth climb. As he later recounted, "I made to the top of Everest along with my client. I brought him back safely to the Everest Base Camp and then immediately started for my fourth summit the same night. My fourth summit attempt started from Base Camp on 22 May with an aim to reach the summit on May 23, and I was alone during my final push to the summit. There were no fellow Sherpas along with me. I carried all the required oxygen and necessities. I started for the summit on 8:00 pm (local time) on 22 May from Camp IV." Tashi's remarkable achievement comes during a time of many record-breaking feats on Everest. Last season, a climber named Dawa Phinjhok Sherpa achieved the summit three times in just eight days, and photojournalist Purnima Shrestha made headlines for achieving the summit three times during the season. 'Tashi represents a new generation of Sherpa climbers—guides, record-breakers, storytellers, and trailblazers,' says mountaineering expert Ang Tshiring Sherpa. 'They are climbing in the era of technological advancement. The world is now connected through smart devices, which, among other things, has even made Everest climbs faster.' Nepal is home to eight of the world's 10 highest peaks and welcomes hundreds of climbers each spring, when temperatures are warmer and winds are typically calmer.
