Hansjörg Auer on top of Lupghar Sar West

This is a real milestone. The Austrian Hansjörg Auer says, he succeeded the first ascent of a big wall of a seven-thousander in the Karakoram – solo. “I climbed the West Face of Lupghar Sar West for the first time. I took a line on the left side and finished my route up the steep Northwest Ridge with very loose rock to the top at 7,157 meters,” the 34-year-old extreme climber wrote on Instagram. Hansjörg had set off to Pakistan in mid-June for his solo project. His originally planned climbing partner and friend Alexander Blümel had to call off due to health problems.

Four years of dreaming

The mountain seen from Hunza valley

“This ascent is very unique to me, because I was dreaming of it for the last four years,” writes Auer. “Since Kunyang Chhish East in 2013 (when he, his brother Matthias Auer and the Swiss Simon Anthamatten made the first ascent of this 7400-meter-high mountain in the Karakoram) I always wanted to know how it feels to be alone in high altitude. And I’m happy that I made this experience now.“

In memoriam Gerry Fiegl

Gerry Fiegl (1988-2015)

Hansjörg Auer dedicates the first ascent of the West Face to his late friend Gerry Fiegl. In fall 2015, Auer, Blümel and Fiegl had mastered the South Face of the 6839-meter-high Nilgiri South in western Nepal for the first time. Gerry had shown symptoms of high altitude sickness at the summit and had fallen to his death on the descent.

The rarely attempted seven-thousander Lupghar Sar – which means “top of the big rock” – has three almost equally high summits and is located in the Hunza region in northern Pakistan. The West Summit was first climbed on 18 June 1979 by the German brothers Hans and Sepp Gloggner, who were part of an eight-member expedition team from Tegernsee.