K2 2018 Summer Coverage: Good Day for K2 Summits, More to Come

Pakistan 8000ers

July 21st 2018 was a good day for K2 climbers. 31 people summited – all from the Nepali company Seven Summits Treks (SST). With 100% success, they had 13 Sherpas, 2 Pakistani High Altitude Porters and 7 clients on the top. The members were from Mongolia, China, Japan, Belgium, Switzerland, Mexico and Ireland. Also three clients and two Sherpas from Summit Climb and two Sherpas from Madison Mountaineering, who were helping with the rope fixing, completed the total of 31. See this post from SST for the names of their summiteers.

Of note there were five women climbers who summited including Gangaamaa Badamgarav who became the first Mongolian to summit K2 as well as the first female from her country. Also Chinese Jianhong Li,  Japanese Naoko Watanabe, Mexican Viridiana Chavez and Swiss climber Sophie Lavaud.

Briton climber Jake Meyer, the youngest Brit to climb Mount Everest in 2005 at age 21 and the youngest Brit to climb the Seven Summits has summited.

K2 Summits in Perspective

It was a good day on K2, but not a record as that was on 26 July 2014 when 33 people stood on top (source with names)

By my count, which could be slightly off, K2 had seen 367 summits through 2017 with 82 deaths. Adding in today’s 31, there are 398 total summits by an estimated 375 individuals. The best year ever for K2 was in 2004 with 51 total summits.

In 2014, there were 49 summits and 1 death: 33 on July 26, 12 on July 27 and 5 more a few days later. Included in these numbers are 6 women: The Nepali women’s team (Oasang Lhamu Sherpa, Maya Sherpa and Dawa Yangzum Sherpa); Chris Burke (New Zealand), Luo Jing (China), Tamara Lunger (Italy).

There were no summits in 2015 and 2016 and in 2017, Mingma G. Sherpa put 12 climbers on the summit made up of 6 Sherpas, 1 Pakistani HAP and 5 members.

Up Next

With so much traffic on the upper mountain the boot path, and fixed ropes, are well established. Assuming no new snow, the next teams will have a well marked trail to follow. Andrzej Bargiel reports in at Camp 4 and is expected to summit Sunday morning and descend by skis. The Madison Mountaineering left Camp 4 at 9:00 am Saturday, 21st July looking to summit in about 12 hours or early Sunday morning. You can follow one of their member, Lisa Thompson on her tracker.

Fredrik Sträng and David Roeske have left K2 BC for their summit push. They hope to get there by Tuesday, 24th July. They are climbing without Os.

Congratulations to all and a safe journey to the rest.

Climb On!
Alan
Memories are Everything

Why this Coverage?

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