South side of Mount Everest

The fog is clearing. The climbers mentioned in my last blog post have spoken. For days, the false report had been tenacious that Tenjing (mostly called “Tenji”) Sherpa and Lakpa Dendi Sherpa were the only mountaineers this season to climb Everest without bottled oxygen. “I think the confusion arose because Sherpa Dendi radio ahead of us on the summit to say we had all made it,” Jon Griffith, Tenjing’s British rope partner, wrote in a comment to my article on Facebook. “Given that Tenji was attempting a no O2 climb and given that radio comms is pretty poor from the summit I suspect that Base Camp assumed that he had climbed without O2 and hence the rumour spread.”

Griffith: Not a bad intent

Tenjing’s post on Instagram

When they returned to Base Camp, Jon said, they had no Internet connection either, because the transmission tower of the Nepalese provider had fallen down: “I don’t think it was an attempt by Iswari [Poudel, head of the expedition operator Himalayan Guides, who spread the news] or anyone to be dishonest, just a lack of information combined with excitement in the Nepalese community that Tenji had (incorrectly) summited without O2, and a heavy dose of the rest of our climbing team being cut off from the internet for a week after the fact.”

Wait for confirmation

Back in Kathmandu, Tenjing Sherpa had informed via Instagram that he had used  a breathing mask above the South Summit at 8,750 meters due to strong winds. What can we learn from it? That expedition operators sometimes overshoot the mark, full of enthusiasm for team’s success (and probably also for marketing reasons). And that it is therefore advisable to wait for confirmation instead of spreading it immediately on the “news market”.

Seven days over 7000 meters

Lech (l.) and Wojciech Flaczynski in the rescue helicopter

Also a summit success of the Polish climbers Lech and Wojziech Flaczynski on Makalu had been reported hastily. In the meantime, Wojziech has clarified this matter. Only he had reached the highest point at 8,485 meters on 24 May, without bottled oxygen, he informed on the Polish website “wspinalie.pl”. His 69-year-old father Lech, who used a breathing mask above Camp 4, had to give up just below the summit. He had suffered from such severe stomach ache that he had been hardly able to move. Therefore, said Wojziech, they had called for emergency help and made an unplanned bivouac at about 8,200 meters.  Due to strong winds and because Lech became weaker and weaker, they had to spent a total of seven days above 7,000 meters. Wojziech reports that it was not until 31 May, a week after his summit success, that they were flown out of Camp 2 by rescue helicopter; his father underwent surgery in a hospital in Kathmandu and is currently recovering. Get well soon, Lech!

Tenjing Sherpa climbing Everest

The good weather window in the Himalayas is impressively long. Since this spring’s first ascent of Mount Everest on 13 May by the Sherpa team that had fixed the ropes up to the summit on the south side of the mountain, climbers have reached the highest point at 8,850 meters day after day. Several hundred summit successes have since been counted. Today, Tenjing Sherpa also succeeded, without bottled oxygen. The 26-year-old wants to climb directly afterwards the neighboring eight-thousander Lhotse, if conditions allow it. According to Iswari Poudel, managing director of the expedition organizer “Himalayan Guides”, Lakpa Dendi Sherpa, just like Tenjing, reached the summit without breathing mask today. It was already Lakpa’s third (!) Everest ascent this season, Poudel said.

Colibasanu and Hamor give up

Horia Colibasanu (r.) and Peter Hamor (l.)

Briton Jon Griffith, who accompanied Tenjing Sherpa to the summit as a photographer and filmmaker, used bottled oxygen on his ascent. They see their expedition as a tribute to their friend, the Swiss top climber Ueli Steck who fell to death a year ago on the nearly-eight-thousander Nuptse. In 2017, Ueli and Tenjing had planned an Everest-Lhotse traverse without bottled oxygen via the Everest West Ridge. That’s exactly what the Romanian Horia Colibasanu and the Slovak Peter Hamor wanted to tackle this spring. They declared their expedition over today. The avalanche danger on the route was too great, Horia explained the decision. They had climbed up to an altitude of 7,500 meters.

Lämmle without breathing mask on Lhotse

Thomas Lämmle on top of Lhotse

Already last Sunday, the German climber Thomas Lämmle reached the 8,516 meter high summit of Lhotse, just eight days after his success on Makalu. “Same style: Solo, without oxygen and carried all equipment (tent, stove, food, sleeping bag, etc.) by my own,” ​Lämmle wrote yesterday on Facebook. For the 52-year-old from the city of Waldburg in Baden-Württemberg, Lhotse was the seventh eight-thousander after Cho Oyu (in 2003), Gasherbrum II (in 2005 and 2013), Manaslu (in 2008), Shishapangma (in 2013), Mount Everest (in 2016) and Makalu.

Three of the four world’s highest mountains in 25 days

Nima Jangmu Sherpa

An extraordinary feat was also achieved by Nima Jangmu Sherpa. The 27-year-old reached yesterday as the first woman from Nepal the 8,586 meter high summit of Kangchenjunga. Thus the Sherpani scaled within 25 days the three highest mountains in Nepal, which are three of the four highest in the world. On 29 April, Nima Jangmu had stood on top of Lhotse, on 14 May on the summit of Mount Everest – with breathing mask. In 2008, the Frenchwomen Elisabeth Revol had also scaled three eight-thousanders in one season. Only 16 days had lain then between her ascents of Broad Peak, Gasherbrum I and Gasherbrum II, without bottled oxygen and Sherpa support.

Besides Nima Jangmu Sherpa, another female climber from the team of the Nepalese expedition operator “Imagine” managed a Kangchenjunga summit success yesterday: Chinese Dong Hong Juan stood on her 13th eight-thousander.

Update 25 May: According to Iswari Paudel, Managing Director of Himalayan Guides Nepal Treks & Expedition P. Ltd., Tenji Sherpa decided after his yesterday’s Everest summit success not to climb Lhotse and instead descend to BC.

Update 1 June: Billi Bierling told me that Tenjing had used bottled oxygen above the South Summit (8,750 m), Lakpka Dendi above the South Col (7,900m). Means: No Everest ascent without breathing mask this spring.