Shishapangma

The Central Peak is not the main summit of Shishapangma. Climbers and expedition operators who tackle this eight-thousander in Tibet should know this. The Central Peak is at 8,008 meters. From there, the normal route continues over a ridge to the 19 meter higher main summit at 8,027 meters. Only when this is reached, Shishapangma is officially considered as scaled. Many are not too particular about this rule. And so the news was premature that a Chinese expedition had scaled Shishapangma on 29 September and that Luo Jing was the first woman from the “Middle Kingdom” to complete the 14 eight-thousanders. Just a few days later, a Basque mountaineer, who had ascended the same day, piped up and said that nobody had climbed the ridge to the main summit due to bad weather. “They were clearly only on the Central Peak,” tells me Eberhard Jurgalski, German chronicler of mountaineering in the Himalayas and Karakorum, who had received a video of the Chinese group from their turning point. “Luo Jing has already admitted this publicly.”

“True Explorers Grand Slam” also not complete

Hong-Juan Dong (l.), Luo Jing (2nd from l.), Zhang Liang (3rd from l.), Liu Yongzong (r.)

Thus also the news that Zhang Liang, Hong-Juan Dong and Liu Yongzong, three more Chinese who belonged to Luo’s team, completed the 14 eight-thousanders, is not true. “Dong is not only missing the main summit of Shishapangma, she was demonstrably not on the highest points of some more eight-thousanders she claimed for herself,” says Jurgalski.

Zhang Liang had already let himself be celebrated in 2017 for being the first Chinese to complete the eight-thousander collection. But even then his list “only” included the Central Peak of Shishapangma – which he has now reached for the second time. This summer’s news that the 54-year-old had finished second after the South Korean Park Young-Seok the “True Explorers Grand Slam” (14 eight-thousanders, Seven Summits, North and South Pole) proved to be premature too. “His performance cannot be compared with that of the South Korean Park anyway,” says Eberhard Jurgalski. “Zhang Liang only did a last-degree expedition to the South Pole, while Park Young-Seok walked the entire way from the edge of the continent to the Pole.” Park died in an avalanche on Annapurna in fall 2011.

K 2, seen from Base Camp

It was a tough piece of work. “Finally we are at the summit of K2,” Mingma Gyalje Sherpa, head of the Nepalese expedition operator Dreamers Destination, wrote on Facebook. Besides him, eleven other climbers had reached the highest point at 8,611 meters, including six Sherpas, Mingma said. Obviously it took them about 16 hours to climb from the last high camp on the K2 Shoulder at about 7,650 meters up to the summit – no wonder considering the large amount of fresh snow, which had previously caused some teams to abandon their attempts due to the avalanche danger.

O’Brien’s fifth 8000er, Zhang’s 13th

Vanessa O’Brien

Among the lucky ones who reached the summit of the second highest mountain on earth was the American-British climber Vanessa O’Brien. For the 52-year-old, K2 was her fifth eight-thousander after Mount Everest (in 2010), Shishapangma, Cho Oyu (both in 2011) and Manaslu (in 2014). In the last two years, O’Brien had returned from K2 empty-handed. The Chinese Zhang Liang also reached the summit today. According to Mingma, the 53-year-old has now scaled 13 eight-thousanders. Since today, John Snorri Sigurjónsson is allowed to call himself the “First Icelander on K2”. The 44-year-old had already summited the eight-thousander Lhotse last May, also as the first climber of his country.

Sherpa power

Mingma had gathered a very strong and experienced Sherpa team around him. Dawa Gyalje Sherpa, Tsering Pemba Sherpa, Nima Tshering Sherpa, Lhakpa Nuru Sherpa, Nima Nuru Sherpa and Ang Tsering Sherpa have all climbed Everest, most of them even several times, in addition other eight-thousanders too. So much Sherpa power was also necessary to break the trail up to the summit of K2. Yesterday John Snorri Sigurjónsson had reported on fresh snow which was up to one meter deep.

Bravo, Mingma!

Mingma Gyalje Sherpa

If there was to award the “Eight-thousander Climber of the Season”, this honor would have to be paid to Mingma Gyalje Sherpa. Last spring, the 31-year-old had already led clients to the summits of the eight-thousanders Dhaulagiri and Makalu in Nepal. At the beginning of the summer, Mingma reached along with his team the summit ridge of Nanga Parbat, but was not sure if they had really found the highest point. Despite frostbite on a toe, which Mingma had suffered during this climb, he now led his team to the summit of K2, which he had climbed for the first time in 2014 – without bottled oxygen. Hats off to Mingma’s performance! However, a climb is only really successful if all members are back in Base Camp safe and sound. This is even more true on the dangerous mountain K2. So, keep your fingers crossed!

Update 29 July: All climbers are back in Base Camp, Mingma reports on Facebook.