Posted: Jul 06, 2009 10:59 am EDT
(K2Climb.net/Madrid) Gerfried Göschl’s ÖAV expedition and the Koreans have set off towards Nanga Parbat’s top, aiming for a July 10 summit day.

Bad weather is still forcing K2 and Gasherbrum climbers to stay put in BC – only Iranians and Spanish have gone up to GII's C1 in order to pitch and secure tents against forecasted storms.

Nanga Parbat

Giuseppe Pompili announced Gerfried’s and Miss Go’s summit push. “Miss Go’s Korean team is heading for C1 tomorrow (today), while their Sherpas proceed all the way to C2. On Tuesday, they’ll fix the route to C3, then they’ll move to C4 on Wednesday, hoping to top-out on Friday, July 10th, Giuseppe wrote. “Mostly all members in Gerfried’s group are following the Koreans.”

“No one in our team has slept in C3 yet – while the Koreans have Sherpas just arrived from Nepal and will probably use O2 in case they need it,” Pompili said. “Therefore, Adriano and I are following the rest to C3, but will then return to BC. On July 12th we will set off again, hoping to reach the summit on July 15th. In addition, Gerfried and three other mates plan to climb on a new route.”

In a Friday update ÖAV expedition leader Gerfried Göschl said the team had used every chance to acclimatize. “We climbed direct from BC to C2 (6000m) on Wednesday. On the following day a hail storm prevented us from going any further; on Friday we returned to BC in bad weather conditions.”

Giusepe Pompili also reported about his chat with Miss Oh, the second Korean lady climber on the mountain. “Miss Oh ensured me she had used O2 only on K2 and Everest, and said she regretted it. After she’s done with the 14x8000ers, she’ll allegedly repeat both peaks in order to top them out without gas. She didn't know that Edurne needed O2 on the way down from Kangchenjunga and laughed when I mentioned that Miss Go claimed to usually climb w/o O2.”

Broad Peak

"Arash mountaineers team left 500 meters of fixed rope at the starting section of Broad’s SW face, in order to locate the safest point for Camp1,” IMZ News reported.

"We worked during a weather break on Thursday morning," member Kiyoumars Babazadeh said over sat-phone from BC.

“With snowy conditions and avalanche risk high, it looks like our BP and K2 teams will be grounded for a few days,” FTA’s home team member Stu reported. Meanwhile, the team have received a cargo in BC, including the new O2 from Poisk, additional rope and extra shovels.

Meanwhile, news is expected from Eelco Jansen’s international team - the team hoped to launch a summit push today.

K2

“The weather has been marginal to say the least, currently it has been snowing for 15 hours and looks to continue for quite a while,” FTA’s leader Fabrizio Zangrilli noted from K2 BC.

“It's beginning to get really difficult to write about doing the same thing (nothing) every day,” FTA’s member Jake Meyer wrote. “Cards, tea, biscuits, books: you know the score by now. Things might be looking a little rosier on the not too distant horizon though.”

Jorge Egocheaga, Martin Ramos and Santiago Quintero have switched routes again. They didn´t like conditions on Cesen route as they climbed to C1 last week, so that they’ve turned back to their original goal: the Abruzzi Spur.

“Finally it has stopped snowing,” Martin reported yesterday. “Despite loads of unstable snow, we will try to reach C1 on the Abruzzi for the night on Monday. Weather permitting, on Tuesday we would proceed as further up as possible before returning to BC.”

Gasherbrums

"I have made two acclimatization climbs: one to Camp 1 (5900m) and asecond trip to C1 and C2,” Philippe Gatta reported from BC on Friday. “(Serap Jangbu and I) are ready for a summit bid – but the weather is not cooperating. We are waiting – some other climbers have already abandoned. I am myself running short of time for my planned triple-header, so I’ll start with the first mountain and then we'llsee."

“The new forecasts predict somewhat good weather for the next few days although we are expecting the jet stream to return to the mountain on the 9th and 10th,” Phil Crampton reported. “We have decided to sit tight at base camp and allow the snow to consolidate but it may take longer than we hoped if we receive more snowfall. If Gasherbrum II needs more time to stabilize we will hopefully start to make some progress on Gasherbrum I. We have met with the Korean, Spanish and Bulgarian teams attempting the mountain this season and the general consensus is that they wish for our Sherpas to fix the route up the Japanese Couloir and above. Most of these teams have just arrived so there is no rush for our Sherpa crew to fix the rope just yet.”

“Nacho, David and Mikel will climb up to Camp I in a few hours,” Nacho Lucero’s home team reported today. “The forecast is for 3 days of good weather followed by winds of up to 100km/hr on the 9th and 10th, so they will try to get to Camp II tomorrow to dismantle it and bury the equipment to keep it safe. Then they will descend to base camp until the windy spell pass. The groups with the big mountaineering companies are not going up today, but our group needs to secure the equipment. There is then a window on the 13th-15th July in which they hope to be able to get to the summit.”

“After twelve hours climbing in fresh snow, Tehrani mountaineers arrived in Camp1 on Friday afternoon,” IMZ News reported. “They planned to return to BC on Saturday.”

”Bulgarian climbers Nikolay Petkov (leader), Doychin Boyanov, Boyan Petro and Nikolay Valkov are attempting Gasherbrum I and Gasherbrum II,” Peter Atanasov told ExplorersWeb last weekend. “Conditions permitting, some members will set off for C2 (6,500m) on Monday.”

Links to climbing teams in Pakistan 2009

Broad Peak:

Elisabeth Revol
Antoine Girard
Ludovic Giambasi
Eelco Jansen
Field Touring Alpine
Iran Mountain Zone News
Karrar Haidri's Saltoro Summits
Serap Jangbu Sherpa
Adventure Tour Pakistan

K2

Fredrik Ericsson
Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner
Maxut Zhumayev
Fabrizio Zangrilli
Jake Meyer
Santiago Quintero
Sean Wisedale
Martin Ramos
Christian Stangl

Nanga Parbat

Gerfried Göschl
Louis Rousseau
Giuseppe Pompili
Joao Garcia

Gasherbrums

Daniela Teixeira & Paulo Roxo
Philippe Gatta
Altitude Junkies
Don Bowie
Valery Babanov
Jagged-Globe
Nacho Lucero
Carlos Soria
Veikka Gustafsson's posts
News on GI/GII Romanian expedition


Lesser peaks and spires

Mt. Noshaq's Afghans to the top

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