Summer 2014 | K2 Summit bid - Time for the Ultimate Push
Weather is holding, snow conditions are good, forecast is promising and majority of climbers reached C4 (7800m), this afternoon. After resting and eating/drinking for a few hours, it’s the time for the ultimate push. It’s the time to go to the summit of K2.
“All of us face 24 hours in our lives that are critical and these are 24 hours in my life that certainly are. The stakes are high; 6 weeks preparation and acclimatizing, six months hard training, last year's tragic aborted attempt and three years planning all comes down to this 24hrs.” British climber Adrian Hayes expressed his feelings from C4, this afternoon.
Leaving C4
“At 19:30 local time three Pakistanis and some Sherpas will start to equip the Bottleneck,” Agostino Da Polenza told Montagna.tv from K2 Base Camp, whereas other climbers were scheduled to leave for the summit from 21:00 hrs local time onwards.
Who is on Summit Push?
Yesterday afternoon, after climbing from C2 to C3, Lakpa and two other Sherpa fixed portion of route from C3 to C4. Today, it’s reported that almost all climbers from first summit push group have reached C4. The teams expected to launch summit-bid tonight are:-
1. Pakistani-Italian Expedition (07 climbers from Pakistan, 03 from Italy)
2. Three Nepalese female climbers
3. Chris Burke and Lakpa Sherpa
4. International Expedition (Al Hancock, Adrian Hayes, Luo Jing)
5. Italian Expedition (Giuseppe Pompili, Tamara Lunger, Nikolaus Gruber, Amin Baig)
6. Czech climbers (Radek Jaros, Petr Masek, Travnicek Jan)
7. Alexandros Aravidis and Panagiotis Athanasiadis - the Greeks
8. Cleo Weidlich and Sherpa (who reached C4 via Cesen route)
It’s reported that there are around a dozen Sherpa in C4, who will be sharing the task of trail breaking and fixing bottleneck, traverse and other dangerous sections of the route, with Pakistani climbers.
Spanish climbers Ferran Latorre and Miguel Ángel Pérez are also in C4, but they will established a fifth camp at 8300m before summit bid.
14x8000ers
It’s reported that K2 will be 14th 8000er for Czech climber Radek Jaros, if he is successful in reaching the top.
Second group
Samuli Mansikka reached C3 this afternoon, “just got to Camp 3 (7450m)! Beautiful in the morning but now cloudy. We can only hope weather holds rest of the week.” American team has also reached C3 after a tiring climb. They are expected to climb to C4 tomorrow and towards summit on 27th, if weather doesn’t deteriorate.
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“All of us face 24 hours in our lives that are critical and these are 24 hours in my life that certainly are. The stakes are high; 6 weeks preparation and acclimatizing, six months hard training, last year's tragic aborted attempt and three years planning all comes down to this 24hrs.” British climber Adrian Hayes expressed his feelings from C4, this afternoon.
Leaving C4
“At 19:30 local time three Pakistanis and some Sherpas will start to equip the Bottleneck,” Agostino Da Polenza told Montagna.tv from K2 Base Camp, whereas other climbers were scheduled to leave for the summit from 21:00 hrs local time onwards.
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| C4 on K2; Source |
Who is on Summit Push?
Yesterday afternoon, after climbing from C2 to C3, Lakpa and two other Sherpa fixed portion of route from C3 to C4. Today, it’s reported that almost all climbers from first summit push group have reached C4. The teams expected to launch summit-bid tonight are:-
1. Pakistani-Italian Expedition (07 climbers from Pakistan, 03 from Italy)
2. Three Nepalese female climbers
3. Chris Burke and Lakpa Sherpa
4. International Expedition (Al Hancock, Adrian Hayes, Luo Jing)
5. Italian Expedition (Giuseppe Pompili, Tamara Lunger, Nikolaus Gruber, Amin Baig)
6. Czech climbers (Radek Jaros, Petr Masek, Travnicek Jan)
7. Alexandros Aravidis and Panagiotis Athanasiadis - the Greeks
8. Cleo Weidlich and Sherpa (who reached C4 via Cesen route)
It’s reported that there are around a dozen Sherpa in C4, who will be sharing the task of trail breaking and fixing bottleneck, traverse and other dangerous sections of the route, with Pakistani climbers.
Spanish climbers Ferran Latorre and Miguel Ángel Pérez are also in C4, but they will established a fifth camp at 8300m before summit bid.
14x8000ers
It’s reported that K2 will be 14th 8000er for Czech climber Radek Jaros, if he is successful in reaching the top.
Second group
Samuli Mansikka reached C3 this afternoon, “just got to Camp 3 (7450m)! Beautiful in the morning but now cloudy. We can only hope weather holds rest of the week.” American team has also reached C3 after a tiring climb. They are expected to climb to C4 tomorrow and towards summit on 27th, if weather doesn’t deteriorate.
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| Italian climbers tackling Black Pyramid (at above 7000m) on July 15th. Photo: Samuli Mansikka |
You may follow frequent updates on Twitter and Facebook. Tweets also appear in sidebar of this weblog.
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