Himalaya Update: Now It's On To Annapurna!

We've got a new Himalaya Wrap-up today over at MountEverest.net. With teams in BC on Everest, and high winds forcast for the next several days, it's time to check in on how the teams are doing on other mountains.

Iñaki Ochoa has left Dhaulagiri, after topping out on the mountain, and is now headed to Annapurna. But before he left Dhaula, he wanted to be sure that we were aware of some other summits and pointed out that Gian Paolo Casarotto and Cristina Castagna both reached the top climbing independently, while Joelle Brupbacher, Richard Brill of Germany, and Russian Dmitry Sinev summitted with Kazakhs Samoilov, Sharipova and Shutov. Ochoa is also proposing that Miss Hawley add Sergio Dalla Longa,as well as his wife Rosa, to the list of summitteers on the mountain in tribute to the climber. Sergio slipped and fell to his death less than 150 meters from the summit while Rosa looked on.

Meanwhile, Andrew Lock is already on Annapurna after knocking off Shisha Pangma. He says his plan now is to climb up to Camp 3 in the next few days and help open the route to Camp 4 with a summit bid coming on the weekend, if everything goes as planned.

Annapurna, the most deadly of all the 8000m peaks, has claimed it's first life of the season, as Dr. Uddhav Prasad Khanal, the Liaison Officer for the Spanish team climbing there, has gone missing. After spending some time in BC with the team, he decided to return to Kathmandu alone, despite being warned about the dangers of traveling the rugged area by himself. He never made it to town and is now considered another victim of the mountain.

Finally, over on Manaslu, the teams have set up C2 and are proceeding to C3, despite bad weather. The plan is to establish C3, and if the weather clears, perhaps make a summit bid in the next few days.