The spell is broken. For the first time this spring, climbers have scaled the summit of Mount Everest also from the Nepalese south side of the mountain. An employee of the Ministry of Tourism informed from the Base Camp that today 14 climbers reached the highest point on 8,850 meters. The route is now secured up to the summit with fixed ropes. According to consistent reports three members of an expedition of the British Gurkha military brigade were among the successful climbers.

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David Goettler and Hervé Barmasse are waiting for their chance. For a good weather window, which allows them to enter the Shishapangma South Face where they – as reported before –want to climb a new route. In contrast to Mount Everest, where both sides of the mountain are overrun by hundreds of climbers, the 38-year-old German and the 39-year-old Italian are alone in their Base Camp on the south side of the Shishapangma. I sent David four questions.

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The Everest wave rolls, at least on the Tibetan north side of the mountain. According to an Indian operator, six clients of their commercial expedition team reached the summit on Saturday, accompanied by ten Sherpas. Among those who stood on the highest point on 8,850 meters was reportedly also Lhakpa Sherpa. It was her eighth summit success on the highest mountain on earth. The 43-year-old Nepalese who lives in the USA remains the woman with the most Everest ascents. Other commercial expeditions have started their first summit attempt.

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The ropes are fixed up to the summit of Mount Everest – at least on the north side of the highest mountain on earth. On Thursday, according to consistent reports, nine Sherpas of an Indian team, responsible for securing the normal route on the Tibetan side, reached the highest point at 8,850 meters. The Nepalese operator Arun Treks, who had organized the expedition, dedicated these first ascents of the Everest season to the Swiss climber Ueli Steck, who had fallen to death on Nuptse on 30 April.

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They did it. Nives Meroi and Romano Benet have climbed their 14th eight-thousander. The Italian couple belonged to a group of six climbers who reached the summit of the Annapurna today at 10.30 a.m. local time. This is reported by the Spanish climber Alberto Zerain, who in his own words was also on top, along with his compatriot Jonatan Garcia. Moreover, two Chileans reached the highest point on 8091 meters, says Alberto. Nives Meroi and Romano Benet, both 55 years old, are the first couple to have reached together the summits of all 14 highest mountains in the world – without the use of bottled oxygen and without sherpa support. It was their third attempt on Annapurna after 2006 and 2009.

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Still, it is only news snippets. But it looks as if today for the first time this spring climbers have reached the summit of Makalu. With an altitude of 8,485 meters, Makalu is the fifth-highest mountain on earth. “We had summits!” twittered the British expedition operator Altitude Junkies from Makalu. “Everybody is safe.” Details are to be published on Thursday. The newspaper “BonDia” from Andorra reported that Domi Trastoy, a 36-year-old climber from the mini-state, had reached the summit without the use of supplemental oxygen. For him, Makalu was the second eight-thousander after Mount Everest, it was stated.

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Everybody is writing about how crowded Mount Everest is. “The mountain is almost completely deserted,” Ralf Dujmovits tells me today via satellite phone. The only German who has so far climbed all 14 eight-thousanders has just returned from his second acclimatization climb on the Tibetan north side of Everest. He spent a night in Camp 2 at 7,700 meters, then he descended, as scheduled, to the Advanced Base Camp (ABC) at 6,300 meters.

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Actually, the first summit successes on Mount Everest had been expected for the past weekend. However, the Sherpa team that wanted to fix the ropes up to the highest point on 8,850 meters on the Nepali south side of the mountain had to turn around because of strong winds. And now it’s snowing. Snowfall is also expected for the next days. After all, the weather forecast for this week predicts little wind in the summit area. Maybe something will be still possible. This does not apply to Ryan Sean Davy. The 43-year-old South African was caught in Everest Base Camp without permit and sent back to Kathmandu.

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He wanted to regain the age record, now he has died in the Base Camp at the feet of Mount Everest. Min Bahadur Sherchan passed away on Saturday afternoon local time, said Gyanendra Shrestha, an official of the Ministry of Tourism, who is staying in the Base Camp on the Nepali side of the highest mountain on Earth. The doctors, according to Shrestha, suspected a heart attack as the cause of death. It is the second fatality of this spring’s climbing season on Mount Everest, after Ueli Steck’s ​fall to death on Nuptse last Sunday.

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He would have liked that. At Tengboche Monastery in the Khumbu area, at almost 4,000 meters, with a view to Mount Everest, Lhotse and Ama Dablam, Ueli Steck’s ​​family bid farewell to the Swiss top climber during a Buddhist ceremony. The 40-year-old had fallen to death on Sunday on the 7861- meter-high Nuptse. “According to the Nepali tradition, the deceased was cremated in an impressive three-hour ceremony,” Steck’s family informed via Facebook. Uelis wife Nicole, his parents and parents-in-law took part. “The family perceived the ceremony as very solemn and impressive, sad and at the same time liberating.” The family will take a part of the ashes back to Switzerland, where a public memorial is planned for friends, acquaintances and companions. Place and time are not yet fixed. On Ueli Steck’ homepage ​​an online book of condolence was established.

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The first summit success this spring on an eight-thousander is reported from Dhaulagiri, the seventh-highest mountain on earth. “We made the summit of Mt Dhaulagiri on Sunday”, Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, head of the expedition operator Dreamers Destination, wrote on Facebook, “on the same day, one of the best soloist died, very sad to hear this news today. RIP Ueli (Steck).” According to Mingma, he reached the highest point on 8,167 meters along with two clients and two other Sherpas. For the 31-year-old Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, Dhaulagiri was the ninth eight-thousander he has summited so far.

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Why did Ueli Steck choose Nuptse to acclimatize himself? This is a question I ask myself, since on Sunday the news of the death of the Swiss spread like a run-fire. A few days earlier, the 40-year-old had climbed towards the West Shoulder of Everest. That made sense. After all, he planned to climb on his Everest-Lhotse traverse via the West Ridge and the Hornbein Couloir to the highest. But Nuptse? Not exactly the classic tour to get acclimatized. What was the added value besides making additional height meters?

Reinhold Messner speculated in several interviews that Ueli might have planned to try the “great horseshoe”, the never-attempted round trip form Nuptse to Lhotse and Everest across the ridges between the mountains. I see no evidence for this after all I have heard and read. The Frenchman Yannick Graziani wrote in his blog that Ueli had asked him three days before his death, if he wanted to accompany him on Nuptse. The 43-year-old, who wants to climb Everest without bottled oxygen this spring, declined. It was really just an acclimatization trip, Yannick’s team told me on request: “Ueli never said or wrote about Nuptse or horseshoe. He was waiting for his Sherpa friend Tenji to recover from frostbite and reach together the West Shoulder.”

On Monday, I had written to some top climbers asking how they had experienced Ueli. Two other answers reached me.

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The mountaineering scene is still paralyzed. No one can really understand that Ueli Steck is no longer among us. The 40-year-old Swiss had fallen to death in the immediate vicinity of Mount Everest yesterday. His corpse had been found at the foot of Nuptse West and had been flown to Kathmandu. His wife, his parents and other relatives are expected in the Nepalese capital. According to the newspaper “Himalayan Times”, Ueli is to be buried in Nepal. Why Steck fell, will probably never be resolved. After all, he was solo climbing again to prepare himself for the planned Everest-Lhotse traverse. His team partner, Tenjing Sherpa, had suffered frostbite and had not been able to accompany Ueli.

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