Much to my surprise and probably many others, Portuguese climber Pedro Queirós, 41, was the first member of 2022 to summit this spring season. He summited at 9:39 am on Monday, May 9, 2022, with Mingma Sherpa of 14summit and owned by Subin Thakuri. They posted:
Congratulation to my dear friend Pedro Queirós and Mingma to be the first Guided team to reach to the summit of Mt. Everest this season. Have safe journey back to the Base Camp.
I’ve known Pedro for a few years now, and this was quite a dream for him. He told me they met the rope team led by Kami Rita Sherpa, who got his record 26th summit, as they were coming down.
Pedro and Mingma went to Camp 3 on Saturday, May 7, then to the South Col on Sunday. It took them five hours to break trail to the Balcony and summited early Monday morning, May 9. He said most of the trail was blown away when they climbed and that the winds were extremely strong throughout their summit night. He went on to say it was “an epic” ascent and added that “the mountain looks very unstable,” adding that it was just the two of them on the summit!
He thanked the National Geographic team for giving them a good weather tip as they originally planned on going up on the 10th. Remember, the NatGeo team is repairing weather stations, so who would know the weather better? He added that the NatGeo team had 10 Sherpas with four members repairing the station above the Hillary Step.
A sincere congratulations to Pedro and MIngma for their strength and courage to be the first guided team this season. More teams left the South Col on Monday night, so we are looking for summits in a few hours or early Wednesday, May 11.
Climb On!
Alan
Memories are Everything
The Podcast on alanarnette.com
You can listen to #everest2022 podcasts on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Google Podcasts, Pocket Casts, RadioPublic, Anchor, and more. Just search for “alan arnette” on your favorite podcast platform.
Summit Coach
If you dream of climbing mountains but are not sure how to start or reach your next level, from a Colorado 14er to Rainier, Everest, or even K2, we can help. Summit Coach is a consulting service that helps aspiring climbers throughout the world achieve their goals through a personalized set of consulting services based on Alan Arnette’s 25 years of high altitude mountain experience, including summits of Everest, K2, and Manaslu, and 30 years as a business executive.
