A seven-man Italian team is heading home from Kimshung in Nepal’s Langtang. The main, unclimbed summit eluded them twice. The first time, bad weather forced them back. Then on November 1, they gave up their second attempt to hurry to nearby Langtang Lirung to rescue Ondrej Huserka if needed.
Yet Francois Cazzanelli, Roger Bovard, Emrik Favre, Jerome Perruquet, Stefano Stradelli, Francesco Ratti, and Giuseppe Vidoni are not leaving empty-handed. Three of them summited 6,305m Kimshung Sar, a neighboring point on the massif.
Two groups, two goals
The team reached Langtang region on October 8 and spent two weeks acclimatizing. Finally, in late October, they launched an alpine-style summit push up Kimshung, but divided into two teams with different goals. Cazzanelli, Perruquet, Ratti, and Vidoni set off on October 24, Aosta Sera reports. From the bergschrund at the base of the face, they climbed eight pitches on ice and reached a point between the central and the northern, or main, summit.
At that moment, the wind increased dramatically. The climbers still managed to climb two more pitches on mixed terrain but finally turned around at 6,550m, with the main summit still unclimbed.
The Lovers Ridge
Meanwhile, the second group of Favre, Stradelli, and Bovard aimed for the south ridge of Kimshung Shar, the lowest point of the massif. The team climbed a 50º snow ramp to the ridge and then followed it on mixed terrain. They avoided several gendarmes and overcame some exposed sections until they reached the 6,305m summit of Kimshung Shar at 2 pm.
The climbers considered continuing to Kimshung’s main summit but soon discarded the idea because of poor snow quality and overhanging cornices on the final stretch.
They named the AI3/4+ route the Arète Des Amoureux (“The Lovers Ridge”) after World Cup skier Jean Daniel Pession and his girlfriend, Elisa Arlian, who died together in a mountain accident earlier this year.
Climbers on one of the Kimshung ridges. Photo: CVA
Called to Langtang Lirung
On November 1, as the team prepared for a second attempt on Kimshung Main, they received an SOS about a crevasse incident from nearby Langtang Lirung.
David Goettler of Germany and Nicolas Hojac of Switzerland, who were also climbing in the area, also responded, according to the Italian team.
One of the Italians at a belay on mixed terrain. Photo: CVA
After the SOS, Cazzanelli, Bovard, Perruquet, and Vidoni headed toward the Lirung Glacier, looking for Holecek and Huserka along their probable descent route. The Czech-Slovak duo had completed the first ascent of the east face of Langtang Lirung and were descending (apparently via another route) when Huserka had what was ultimately a fatal fall into a crevasse.
Ratti and Stradelli went to the base camp to help with communications, and Emrik Favre and photographer Damiano Levati scouted the mountain with their photo gear and located the area where Huserka had fallen. A helicopter tried to do a reconnaissance flight but had to turn around because of low clouds and darkness.
Help no longer needed
The report shared by Aosta Sera is sketchy at this point, but we can infer that the Italians retreated to the village of Kyangi Gumpa that evening, ready to continue the search the following morning. However, one of the “survivors” (obviously Holecek) told them that their help was not needed any longer, as the Czech-Slovak team “had decided to continue on their own,” the report read.
On Saturday, November 2, friends of Huserka asked the climbing community for help and arranged a long-line rescue. Marek Holecek returned to Kathmandu and, later that day, wrote on social media how Huserka had been seriously injured in the fall and eventually died in his arms.
The long-line rescue was still scheduled for November 3 but was called off because of bad weather. It is unclear if they will try to retrieve Huserka’s remains on another long-line attempt.
The Italians have left their camp and are currently on their way back to Kathmandu, as seen in a photo they shared on social media.
The Italian team dining in a lodge today. They are on their way back to Kathmandu and then home. Photo: Francois Cazzanelli
