Sung Taek Hong on Lhotse South Face

The half dozen is full. For the sixth time, Sung Taek Hong returns empty-handed from Lhotse to South Korea, for the fifth time from the South Face of the 8,516-meter-high mountain in Nepal. As already reported, also the second summit attempt failed. Despite strong winds, Hong had ascended again to Camp 4 at 8,250 meters on November 20 and spent a night there in a broken tent, Kyu-po Pyun, spokesman of the Korean expedition, wrote to me. Hong “was aware that safe climbing is not possible anymore. He decided to descend.”

No option but to abandon the expedition

Difficult conditions

The team set off from the base camp on 16 November, wrote Pyun. The wind was so strong that Hong was hardly able to stand. “He had to lean on fixed ropes and ice axes to hold his body.” At the summit, the jet stream was blowing at speeds of more than 120 kilometers per hour. “The weather seemed to be not getting better anymore in this season. He had no option but to end the expedition.”

“Lifelong objective”

Sung Taek Hong can return to South Korea with his head held high – as he did in his earlier attempts. The 50-year-old as well as the Spaniard Jorge Egocheaga and their companions have given it their all. A total of three times they reached an altitude of 8,250 meters in the wall and were thus higher than the summits of nine of the 14 eight-thousanders. But the summit of the fourth highest mountain on earth remained beyond their grasp. According to Kyu-po Pyun, Hong “wishes he can come back to Lhotse South Face next spring to complete his lifelong objective”.

High up in the Lhotse South Face

Once again, the Lhotse South Face in Nepal was a too hard nut to crack. A first summit attempt of the South Korean Sung Taek Hong and the Spaniard Jorge Egocheaga in early November ended in Camp 4 at 8,250 meters. This is what Kyu-po Pyun, spokesman of the expedition, writes to me. Hong and his team entered the wall on 29 October. The South Korean had hoped that the sun and wind would have removed the snow out of the wall. Instead, according to Pyun, it was unexpectedly snowy on 30 and 31 October so that the climbers first had to free the ropes that they had fixed during the previous ascent from snow and ice. The team therefore made slow progress, the work tired them. Then the next setback: The tents in Camp 2 (at 7,200 m) and Camp 3 (7800 m) were ripped, the poles broken, the food and gas cartridges which they had deposited there before were blown off the mountain.

At most one last attempt

Lhotse South Face

Nevertheless, Sung Taek Hong ascended to Camp 4 on 1 November. Because of too strong winds and too much snow, the expedition leader then, however, stopped the summit attempt and safely returned to the Base Camp one day later, writes Kyu-po Pyun. According to him, Hong is preparing for a second and definitely last summit attempt. The possible summit day is still open, but will be certainly by 15 November. After that, according to Pyun, the expected jet stream with wind speeds of more than 100 km/h will scupper any summit chance Sung Taek Hong has literally got stuck into this ambitious project. The 50-year-old Korean is tackling the Lhotse South Face already for the fifth time.