Three hours ago, Kami Rita Sherpa’s rope-fixing team reached the summit of Everest. It was already very late in the day. They conveyed the news by radio at 6:55 pm Nepal time. This marks Kami Rita’s 26th Everest summit. However, he has a long way back to at least Camp 4 in the dwindling light. A total of seven Sherpas summited out of a team of at least 11.
Everyone to the summit!
After the summit news came, the canvas village at the foot of Everest exploded in a whirlwind of activity. Buoyed by a good long-range forecast, climbers are packing their gear and girding themselves mentally for the next few days. A massive summit push is unfolding.
Climbers on the upper part of the Khumbu Icefall. Photo: Seven Summit Treks
Some teams — such as Full Circle, the all-Black group from the U.S. — have confirmed that they are heading up tonight. Some others will leave tomorrow and keep abreast of the location of others on the mountain, in order to minimize crowding on summit day.
Other teams remain noncommittal about their summit plans. Elite Exped, for instance, just notes that the clients who were resting downvalley have returned to Base Camp until their summit push begins. But they gave no specific date on when that would be.
Lines of climbers should be crossing the Khumbu Icefall very early on Sunday and Monday (Nepal time). Others are already in Camps 1 and 2.
Four camps on Everest this season
This year, several teams have a Camp 1 in the Western Cwm. Some years, especially later in the year, climbers skip Camp 1. However, it comes in handy when the route through the Icefall is long. “And this year is long,” Lukas Furtenbach told ExplorersWeb from Base Camp.
Furtenbach is also prepping a summit push for his “express” clients. After weeks of training in hypobaric chambers, they landed in Nepal already partly acclimatized. Instead of the usual rotation, they went up Mera Peak and are now ready to climb Everest, after just 10 days!
Climbers hold their final puja to ask for the mountain gods’ permission to climb Everest. Photo: Lukas Furtenbach
“We have a 10-day summit window,” said Furtenbach. “Any day could be a good summit day, so teams will surely spread out over the next week or so.”
Kangchenjunga: Horia on top without O2
On Kangchenjunga, Horia Colibasanu has achieved the first Romanian summit on the third highest peak on Earth without O2 or support from a personal Sherpa. He summited at around noon Nepal time.
His partners, Peter Hamor and Marius Gane, failed to reach the top and are now back in Camp 4. Hamor turned around 200m below the summit, according to his home team. Marius Gane retreated shortly before. No news yet from Csaba Varga of Hungary, who is climbing independently and without supplementary O2.
Horia Colibasanu has bagged the first Romanian summit of Kangchenjunga, and he did it without O2. Photo: Horia Colibasanu
Also, Nirmal Purja summited today with an unknown number of clients and staff, according to climbers in Base Camp.
Sirbaz Khan and two other members of Mingma G’s team climbed all the way down to Base Camp. The others are resting overnight in Camp 2. Khan’s partner, Saad Munawar, confirms that the Pakistani climber did finally use some supplementary O2 at some point during the climb.
Dhaulagiri’s Camp 2
Billi Bierling, a member of Kari Kobler’s team, managed to get a cell phone connection from Dhaulagiri’s Camp 2. She told ExplorersWeb that the team is spending the night there and aims to summit on Monday. Bierling also texted that more climbers were in Camp 2 and possibly in Camp 3, but she didn’t want to speculate about their plans.
Currently, Kristin Harila’s tracker is off again. But previous waypoints located her on her way to Camp 3. This means that she (and the rest of the 8K team) could reach the top tomorrow.
Billi Bierling’s tracks during her climb to Dhaulagiri’s Camp 2 today. Photo: Billi Bierling
Nuptse: Wrong way!
“We’ve had a massive, brutal day,” Tim Mosedale has just posted on Instagram. “The route up Nuptse is super-steep and goes on forever. “[We] broke trail all the way because the trail and ropes were covered in snow…
“To top it off, we didn’t summit. We ended up on the right side of the main Nuptse summit, not the left side, where the true summit was. This, despite numerous meetings, conversations, and photos,” Mosedale said, clearly upset. “So we won’t be joining the list of ascensionists after all.”
The climbers were reportedly very tired and dehydrated, but otherwise safe.
Mosedale’s words contradict previous local press reports, which said that 10 people reached the summit among Mosedale and Madison’s groups. In fact, the 3D map featured on Mosedale’s tracker clearly shows that the team had gone too far right. They needed to reach the notch (just below the Nuptse 1 label), then turn left to the summit.
Tim Mosedale and Rebecca Ferry’s location on Nuptse today at 6 pm Nepal Time. Map by Everest3D
