{"id":37781,"date":"2021-01-07T10:02:06","date_gmt":"2021-01-07T17:02:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/?p=37781"},"modified":"2021-01-07T16:50:59","modified_gmt":"2021-01-07T23:50:59","slug":"winter-k2-update-no-january-2021-summits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/2021\/01\/07\/winter-k2-update-no-january-2021-summits\/","title":{"rendered":"Winter K2 Update: No January 2021 Summits??"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The winds continue to hit K2 and now some are feeling a bit less optimistic than even a few days ago.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Big Picture<\/h3>\n<p>It was expected, a long period of high winds combined with harsh temperatures conspire to hurt morale. Boredom is setting in with little to do while waiting for the next window.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/johnsnorri\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">John Snorri Sigurjonsson<\/a>\u00a0told me just a few days ago that &#8220;Often the jet stream slow down mid jan and pick up again I will use the opportunity but the work is hard. I will stick to my plan. I have supplies till March. I will not underestimate K2 I respect and will work with nature&#8221; But today told me directly:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>I think no one will summit K2 in January<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>There are four main teams on K2 this winter. Everyone is at Base camp waiting out the weather.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/climbermingma\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mingma Gyalje Sherpa<\/a>: 3 people, all Sherpas<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Nirmal PurjaPurja\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Nirmal Purja<\/a> : Nirmal Purja plus six Nepalis\/Sherpas in support, One client looking to experience BC and perhaps C1<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/johnsnorri\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">John Snorri Sigurjonsson<\/a> with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/muhammadalisadpara\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Muhammad Ali Sadpara<\/a> and son: a three-person independent team<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sevensummittreks\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Seven Summits Trek&#8217;s<\/a> (SST) 49 person commercial team with over 22 clients with various experience on 8000-meter winter climbs and 27 Sherpas in support.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3>Mingma G &#8211; At BC<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/climbermingma\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Mingma Gyalje Sherpa<\/a> is resting at BC. He and his small Sherpa-only team have reached 7000-meters, roughly at the top of the Black Pyramid. He gave this brief update today:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Since 31st Dec 2020, we have been staying in base camp waiting for another good window to go and deposit our equipment to camp3 and try to fix camp4.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I asked him about his foot and he said it was healing and sent me this picture:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-37792\" src=\"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-169x225.jpeg\" alt=\"\" width=\"169\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-169x225.jpeg 169w, https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-360x480.jpeg 360w, https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-1153x1536.jpeg 1153w, https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-1000x1332.jpeg 1000w, https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-230x306.jpeg 230w, https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-350x466.jpeg 350w, https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound-480x640.jpeg 480w, https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/MIngma-wound.jpeg 1537w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 169px) 100vw, 169px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img class=\"aligncenter\" \/><\/p>\n<h3>Seven Summits Treks: All at BC<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sevensummittreks\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Seven Summits Trek&#8217;s<\/a> commercial team has regrouped at K2 Base Camp. They suggest a summit bid after January 14, 2021. The leader of the SSST team, Dawa Sherpa posted this update:<\/p>\n<div class=\"nc684nl6\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/14x8000\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Atanas Skatov<\/a> gave us this insight from Base Camp:<\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div dir=\"auto\">The weather is very bad at Base Camp. High wind and low temperatures blowing. I don&#8217;t know if at the top I&#8217;ll have the opportunity to remove and wave the flags, but today at 40 km \/ hr it was very difficult and only at 5250 m high in the glacier.\u00a0Thank you warmly to everyone who contributed to make this expedition a reality and Bulgaria has a first winter participation at a peak of more than eight thousand meters and K2.\u00a0Together forward and upwards to the top, dear friends and I ask for your stormy applause, because without the sponsors there would be no participation in this expedition!\u00a0For Bulgaria<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Also, I liked what Alessandro Fillipini said on\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/alpinistiemontagne.gazzetta.it\/2021\/01\/06\/tutti-al-campo-base-al-k2-2\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> Carlos Garranzo Iba\u00f1ez<\/a>\u00a0blog (click the link for the full post):<\/div>\n<blockquote>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Today the situation at K2 is very simple: everyone at base camp. Except Waldemar Kowalewski, of course. As is well known, the Pole was evacuated by helicopter.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">\n<p><span class=\"goog-text-highlight\">WEATHER Bad weather, with impetuous winds that add up to very low temperatures, block operations. <\/span>How long? This is the question everyone asks. It seems that an improvement is coming from Friday and that Sunday is the best day for a window that could close on Monday. These are all forecasts to be confirmed. The only sure thing is that there will be no major snowfall even in the next 10 days.<\/p>\n<p>PROGRAMS As is known, the route is partially aided up to a low c3, under the Black Pyramid. For the traditional c3 there are about 200 meters left. In order to think about summit attempts it is essential to equip this field and then the route up to the Spalla, including a possible c4 immediately below. Nirmal Purja said that at the next window he with his team (5 Sherpas), Mingma G. with his two Sherpas and a couple of SST&#8217;s will go up to rig up to c4.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>And finally from the SST team, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/noel.hanna.35\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Noel Hanna<\/a>, by way of his wife Lynne:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>A brief update from Base Camp all well with Noel he was feeling a bit bored yesterday so did some sewing of his gear !!! It\u2019s been a quiet week high winds coming in tomorrow you can see the change in the weather today as the storm approaches we will await further updates from Noel tomorrow&#8230;..<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<div>\n<div>\n<h3>Broad Peak &#8211; En Route<\/h3>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/zoltan.szlanko\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Zolt\u00e1n Szlank\u00f3<\/a> and A<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/alex.goldfarb.3\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">lex Goldfarb<\/a> are trekking the Baltoro Glacier and should be at Base Camp within the next few days.<\/p>\n<h3>Manaslu &#8211; En Route, Heavy Snow<\/h3>\n<p>Over 3 feet of new snow is being reported around Manaslu Base Camp. This is what has stopped many previous winter attempts. We&#8217;ll see what happens this year.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/iamsimonemoro\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Simone Moro<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/iamsimonemoro\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Alex Txikon<\/a>, and I\u00f1aki Alvarez have left Kathmandu for their winter attempt of Manaslu. They anticipate arriving at Base Camp around January 11, 2021. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/climber_tenji\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tenji Sherpa<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/climber_tenji\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Vinayak Jaya Malla<\/a>, both Nepali internationally certified mountain guides (IFMGA) are also on Manaslu. Currently, they are back in Samagaun resting after doing acclimatization hikes in the area.<\/p>\n<p>Climb On!<br \/>\nAlan<br \/>\nMemories are Everything<\/p>\n<p><strong>Resources<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/reader-polls\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Share your opinion on the reader polls<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/aN5gtrkwgb4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">A 30-minute documentary of Alan&#8217;s 2014 K2 Summit.<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The winds continue to hit K2 and now some are feeling a bit less optimistic than even a few days ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":31105,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"The winds continue to hit K2 and now some are feeling a bit less optimistic than even a few days ago.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"dois","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[7,422,562,597],"tags":[42,598,487,602],"class_list":["post-37781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-climbing-news","category-k2","category-k2-2020-coverage","category-k2-winter","tag-k2","tag-k2-winter","tag-mingma-gyalje-sherpa","tag-Nimral-purja"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/36294311_1610362439089732_2302554365640048640_n.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.alanarnette.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}