Karakoram Diaries – 21st July
A round-up of today’s updates from the mountains of the Karakoram.
Individuals have released statements regarding the events on Broad Peak over the past few days.
(Updated throughout the day)
“STATEMENT about BROAD PEAK events on 18th and 19th July and rescue of Nastya Runova.”
“Together with Hugo Ayaviri and Jesper Niels we summited at 3:15pm. On our way down we met some fixing team members from Pakistan, Nastya Runova and the Korean team.
“At 5:14pm I got a message via inReach from Nastya sent from 8036 m asking me to wait for her. I waited at the Col (7850m). After around 2 hours I heard Hussein (a Pakistani from Korean team) screaming that a women had fallen near the last section before the Col. I left my bag pack and run up. It was Nastya.
“We tried to help her with Stefan from Austria and Hussein for a couple of hours. She finally got out to a safe place at around 10:00pm.
“Nastya was mentally stable but with light frostbites. She lost one crampon and her jumar. We descended to Col where I boiled some water. It was 10:25pm.
“Stefan started his descend and we followed. Shortly after we started, Nastya slipped and lost her head torch. I gave her my backup one. We descended on an incredibly slow pace until 7650m. At this moment Nastya slided down around 100 m (during her fall she passed the crevasse that we had to deal with two days before). Stefan and me went down as soon as possible and found her lying down. She was in good state but in shock. Again I boiled more water, Steff confirmed we were good and continued.
“After a while we continued. Our descend looked like this: I was going first, then Nastya was clipped to the rope with her carabiner and holding my hand or arm so that I stop her fall. We would stop every 10-15 steps so that she could keep her breath and pace. On the way we met Peter from UK, he helped us with his presence and some hot water and chocolate. His porter gave us his radio, we talked with BC and explained the situation and said we would continue. Peter joined us for some time. Our painful descend (we hadn’t eat anything solid for 27 hours) continued until 5:00am. 100 meters above Camp3 we met the Russian members of Death Zone Freeride Team. I spoke with Vitaly for a minute and continued. Anton helped Nastya going down since then until Camp 3 and me myself I went directly to the tent. I entered it at 5:10am.”
Death Zone Freeride (Broad Peak)
“Timeline of rescue mission on Broad Peak. July 17-19.
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“On July 17, at 23:00 local time, the DZF team began the ascent to the summit from Camp 3 (7100 m). Around the same time, another 5 teams start to climb. A good forecast was literally for two days, and everyone was in a hurry.
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“On July 18, at 16:30 local time, Anton Pugovkin, Vitaly Lazo and Thomas Lone decided to turn back: it was still an hour and a half to the top, and the guys understood that they would have to go down in the dark, and decided not to risk it.
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“On July 18, at 20:00 the DZF team descended to Camp 3, decided to continue the descent and make a second attempt a week later, in better weather conditions.
At the same time, several groups continued their ascent, including a Korean team and a group with a young climber from Russia Anastasia Runova.
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“At 24:00 a message was received: in the col area at 7900 m there was a fall, a girl fell. It also became known that an emergency situation occurred with Kim Hong-Bin.
“At 00:15 on July 19th Anton and Vitaly went to rescue, climbers in Camp 3 collected additional medicines and oxygen.
According to preliminary data, Anastasia was pulled out from the crack by a porter, and they began to descend. From this point she descended without the crampons (they were left in the crack).
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“At 4 o’clock in the morning, Anton Pugovkin and Vitaly Lazo met Anastasia, she was given an injection of Dex and a drink, and the descent began.
Vitaly took a walkie-talkie and an oxygen and went to help Mr. Kim.
Meanwhile Anton brought Anastasia to Camp 3. As a result, after resting, she, with the help of her comrades, was able to reach Base Camp safely.
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“At 13:30 Anton went out to meet Vitaly, who was trying to save Kim. Unfortunately, there was another fall during the rescue mission, Kim fell from an 80-degree wall…
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“When Vitaly ascended to Kim at an altitude of 7900 meters, there were several Pakistani porters and Korean climbers nearby.
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“Vitaly rappelled into a crack of 20 meters, and helped Kim to anchor — the alpinists began to climb. But after some time, according to the assumption, Kim’s jumar had been blocked (Vitaly was 5 meters down).”
“He shouted to Kim — the Korean alpinist was moving, trying to unblock the jumar. Then there was a sharp fall, and Kim fell.
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“With 99% certainty, we can say that he died immediately. It was horrible, but Vitaly safely climbed out of the crack and began to descend.
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“At 17:20, Anton and Vitaly met, and began the descent to the Base Camp from a height of 7100 m.
Partly they went down on skis, partly on foot, because of the blizzard.
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“At 21:16 they were already in Base Camp, Thomas Lone arrived there a little earlier.”
Pete Brittleton and Paul Etheridge (Broad Peak)
“Over the years we have experienced lots of incidents, it comes with the nature of these summits we seek. We do not believe incidents should be an opportunity to promote. We feel it is important for us to make statement confirming the actual events from the 18th July.
“On the 18th July, Broad Peak, Pete and I were the only team to set off on our summit bid at 8pm. ALL other teams had set off 24hrs earlier when the mountain was NOT fixed.
“After making great progress with our porters, at 1am we began to receive emergency contact through our radio informing us of missing and injured climbers.
“At 4am our military liaison officer asked us to coordinate a rescue at 7600m as we were the only climbers out. Both Pete and I forfeited our summit attempt, but were happy to do so to help save the lives of other climbers. Others at camp 3 were asked to assist on the mountain but sadly refused. We worked through the early hours with the military, basecamp and our aid in the UK Ady to conduct our efforts.
“Pete supported a casualty and some exhausted climbers back to safety and assisted them with water, food and his presence whist I stayed on the mountain to coordinate his HAPs and later search and rescue for missing climbers. After many hours of searching and inevitable exhaustion- eventually, I was pleased to see a climber had been sent from C3 along with a team of support to help take over, I passed on my search pattern from the tracker and they began another search at a different location.
“Stories emerging of other support and parties helping out are categorically untrue. Until 06:55am we were the only climbers ascending the mountain and sadly witness to this tragedy on the mountain. “
“Pete and Paul wish to give condolences to Mr Kim’s family and team mates. Their thoughts are with them.
“This is our 2nd rotation on k2. I know this mountain very well. This year I observe alot of snow in high camps specially C3 and C4. We searched these areas but we didn’t find any clues. Weather was perfect.
“Purpose of Climbing k2: I am here for a search mission and we are making a documentary.
“Thank you Elia Saikaly for his support and also thanks to Sherpa PK, Fazal Ali and Aziz Baig.”
Mathieu Maynadier (Pumari Chhish)
“Karakoram Mushroom » Great attempt on Pumari Chhish east and first ascent of the South east ridge.
Unfortunately on the fourth day of our ascent the weather was not good as expected and we were catch by the storms and forced to stop our ascent at the base of the final Mushroom of the east summit of the Pumari Chhish east.
With Tom Livingstone we just came back from three weeks in the camp. It was a great trip on a magical place. After a light acclimatization (2 night at 5200m) in a mix weather when the first good window came we decide to give a try on the South east ridge.
This ridge less steep that our initial plans gave us some hardcore fight with the snow and some crazy ridge parts typical from Karakoram.
The first three days were under a weather than rarely in Karakoram no one clouds and more than 150km view.
But on the fourth day some unexpected bad weather came …we push at the maximum and around 11am it was too much the spindrift became bigger and after reaching the top of the mix at the base of the final Mushroom we decided to stop.
And hopefully we find our tent totally crashed by snow ans the descent was epic surrounded by avalanches.
Finally after a almost 20h fight on the fourth day we were safe on the glacier.
“It was our first trip together with the super psyched Tom Livingstone and that work perfectly thanks man for your great enthousiam amd looking forward next climb together.”
Summer Season in the Karakoram – 2021
Main Photo: Saulius Damulevicius
