South Koreans on Lhotse South Wall
This year one video caught our eye above all: The South Koreans on the notorious Lhotse south wall getting pummeled by ice and snow.
Lhotse’s south face has rejected some of the best climbers in history – the Polish winter masters and Reinhold Messner included – and a simple glimpse at the mighty wall is enough to understand the level of difficulty and risks involved.
u2028The overwhelming mass of rock and ice is over 3,000 feet tall, and provides one of the most challenging climbs above 8,000 meters. The few who ever dared to attempt it were big names in climbing history. The south face of Lhotse is linked to the lives and deaths of men such as Jerzy Kukuzkca, Tomo Cesen, Ricardo Cassin, Cristof Profit and more.
Over the years we had seen nothing at Explorersweb like the avalanches punishing the Korean climbers on the wall this fall. To close 2014, last week we caught up with expedition leader Seong Taek Hong (in his third attempt on the face) for an inside on the climb.
