American summits Everest for record 11th time

by Kraig Becker on

Last week we mentioned that Apa Sherpa, the legendary mountain guide, reached the summit of Mt. Everest, extending his record to an impressive 19th time on top of the world. A few days later, we noted that British explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes also reached the summit, on his third attempt, at the age of 65.

Over the weekend, American mountaineer Dave Hahn, climbing with the First Ascent Team, also successfully topped out on the mountain, reaching the 29,035 foot summit, which is the highest point on the planet. For Hahn, this is his 11th trip up the mountain, a record for a non-Sherpa.

Hahn is a professional mountain guide who has scaled big mountains all over the world, and his resume includes 26 ascents of Mt. Vinson, the highest peak in Antarctica, and 18 summits of Denali, the tallest mountain in North America. He’s also been to the top of Mt. Rainier nearly 250 times in his illustrous career.

Congratulations to Dave, and the rest of the First Ascent Team for an amazing effort this year on Everest. With the entire team now down safely off the mountain, they are preparing for the trek back to Lukla, where they’ll catch a flight to Kathmandu, and finally, after nearly two months in Nepal, they’ll head home.

Sir Ranulph Fiennes conquers Everest at 65

by Sean McLachlan on

A 65 year-old man who suffers from vertigo has climbed to the summit of Mt. Everest.

He is the famous English adventurer Sir Ranulph Fiennes, who adds this latest feat to a long string of successes such as crossing Antarctica unaided. In an exclusive interview with the BBC, Sir Ranulph says the key to avoiding vertigo is “not looking down” but he managed to take a peek when he reached the summit because “when you’re in that particular spot it would be a shame not to.”

The adventurer tried to scale the summit in 2005 but suffered a heart attack. Only a few months after his first heart attack in 2003, he ran seven marathons on seven continents in seven days, battling both exhaustion and jetlag. So it really wasn’t a great surprise that this guy made it up Everest eventually.

The BBC has also posted videos on the journey to get to the Everest base camp, which at 5,300 meters above sea level is a popular destination for hardy trekkers, and the journey to the summit via the South Col route. The summit stands at 8850 meters above sea level and is the highest point on Earth. The BBC, which always rises to the occasion when an Englishman truly rocks, has posted a detailed biography on Sir Ranulph.

The climb was done to raise money for the Marie Curie Cancer Care, a charity for which Sir Ranulph has raised huge sums of money in memory of his wife, who died from stomach cancer.

While Sir Ranulph has shown himself to be one of the world’s greatest living adventurers, he’s not the King of Everest. That honor goes to Apa Sherpa, who recently climbed Everest for the 19th time.

Sherpa summits Everest for record 19th time

by Kraig Becker on

Yesterday was the third straight day of summits on Everest, with more than 100 climbers making an attempt on the mountain from both Nepal’s South Side and from Tibet to the north. Weather conditions have been excellent and the winds at the summit have been unusually calm, aiding the climbers and extending the weather window longer than expected.

One of the climbers amidst the dozens going up the mountain is a mountaineering legend by the name of Apa Sherpa. Apa is the record holder for the most summits of any climber in Everest history, having recorded 18 previous trips up the mountain. Yesterday’s succesful summit adds to the legend, giving him number 19.

Apa began his illustrious career on Everest back in 1988 when, as a young guide, he made his first attempt on the mountain. That attempt ended in failure above 27,000 feet. The next two attempts also ended without Apa reaching the summit, but in 1990 he helped guide a team from New Zealand to the top of the world, standing on the peak of Everest for the first time. He has achieved a successful summit every year since.

Following that first summit, Apa became a Sirdar, or Senior Guide, and is now considred to be amongst the most skilled and experienced high mountain guides in the world. A few years back, he and his family, moved to Utah to give his children the opportunity for a better education, but each spring he returns to Nepal to lead a group of climbers up the tallest mountain on the planet.

Congratualtions to Apa Sherpa on his record 19th summit of Everest. What an amazing feat!

The Stage is Set on Everest

by Kraig Becker on

The Himalayan spring climbing season is rapidly approaching its busiest time, with teams on Everest preparing to finally make a run at the summit. The stage was set for that to occur yesterday when the first climbers of 2009 reached the top, as an extremely skilled group of five Sherpas completed fixing the lines to the peak.

First to top out was Mingma Tenzing, closely followed by Panuru Sherpa, both climbing with the International Mountain Guides team. Next was Kami Rita, climbing with Alpine Ascents, and finally Dorje and Nima Tsering, who are part of the Himalyan Experience team. On the south side of Everest, teams work together to set the ropes up the mountain, and these three teams are the biggest, and most well funded on the mountain. They pooled their resources to help ensure that everyone has a safe road to the top.

British climber David Tait was not far behind the Sherpas, and he became the first non-Sherpa to summit this season. For Tait, this is his third time on top of Everest, making the journey without the use of supplemental oxygen. This is an unusually early summit, as generally weather slows down the progress, but until this past weekend, it has been very calm in the region.

No more summits are expected to take place until next week. The other teams are just now finishing their acclimatization process, and more bad weather is expected in the next few days. The First Ascent team, consisting of climbing legends like Ed Viesturs and Dave Hahn, have projected that they will begin their summit bids on May 8th with the hope of reaching the top on the 12th. Looks like next week will be very busy on the highest mountain on Earth.

Ed Viesturs, America’s Top Mountaineer, Returns To Everest

by Kraig Becker on

Yesterday we mentioned that Kathmandu has become a very busy place this week as climbers and trekkers heading to the Himalaya arrive in the city before setting out on their various adventures in the more mountainous regions of Nepal. Amongst those making the journey once again this year is Ed Viesturs, who many consider to be America’s premiere mountaineer.

Viesutrs has a long, and storied career climbing mountains, and has topped out on some of the most famous peaks in the world, including Rainier, Denali, and of course Everest, which he’s successfully summitted six times. Back in 2005, on his third attempt at the mountain, Viesturs added Annapurna to his resume, completing his Endeavour 8000 project, which was a decade long mission to reach the summit of the world’s 14 8000 meter peaks. Not only did Ed finish this task, becoming the first, and to date only, American to do so, he topped out on each of the mountains without the use of supplemental oxygen.

After finishing the Endeavour 8000 project, Ed vowed to retire from climbing the big peaks, saying that he had accomplished everything that he had ever hoped to do on those mountains, and for a time, his attention was drawn to other adventures. But the lure of the Himalaya is strong, and Viesturs is once again in Kathmandu, planning to make an attempt on Everest, and claim his seventh summit on the world’s tallest mountain.

For this attempt, Ed is part of an all-star team of climbers, that includes Dave Hahn, who has 10 Everest summits to his credit already, and Peter Whittacker, son of legendary climber Lou Whittaker and nephew to Jim Whittaker. The team was put together by gear manufacturer Eddie Bauer, who are launching a new line of outdoor gear uner the First Ascent label.

There will be few teams on Everest with as much experience as this one. But they’ll have to still go through the same process if they hope to successfully reach the top of the mountain. Over the next few weeks they’ll be acclimatizing, establishing their high camps, and preparing to make their summit bid. With any luck, Viesturs will soon be adding another chapter to his already substantial legend, standing at the Roof of the World for the seventh time.