Famous Swiss climber Ueli Steck killed close to Mount Everest in Nepal

Ueli Steck, the famous Swiss Climber, was killed in an accident close to Camp II on Mt Everest on Sunday morning. It has confirmed by multiple sources at the base camp of Mount Everest.

A group of six rescuers discovered a body of the multiple-record holder mountaineer close to the Nuptse Face of Mount Everest peak wherever he might have slipped and fallen on the ice-covered slope. Fellow mountaineers had seen him ascending Mt Nuptse alone at around 4:30 am.

The body of renowned Swiss climber Ueli Steck being loaded on a helicopter close to Camp II of Mount Everest, Nepal, on 30^th April 2017.

The team has collected the scattered components of the climber’s body. A Fishtail Air helicopter has also been sent to Camp II to conduct a long line rescue, according to a source at base camp.

This is the 1st death of this climbing season in Mt Mount Everest.

Swiss mountain climber Steck and Tenzing (Tenji) Sherpa headed to Khumbu region to try to climb Mt Everest by Hornbein Couloir route without using supplemental oxygen. They also set out a plan to make a descent to the South Col before taking the once climbed direct route just below the Lhotse Face to obtain that summit record.

Steck, who won two Piolet d’Or awards in 2009 and 2014, is also famous for his speed records on the North Face trilogy in the Alps. He won his second award in 2014 after making the first solo ascent of Mt Annapurna. Steck who was the first recipient of the Eiger Award for his mountaineering achievements in 2008, also completed his 82 Summits project, ascending all 4000 m peaks in the Alps, in 61 days in 2015.

In 2013, an ambitious plan to summit Mt Everest was foiled after Steck along with Italian alpinist Simone Moro and Jonathan Griffith engaged in a heated confrontation with rope fixing Sherpas.

Last year, Steck and his German climbing partner, David Göttler, spotted the bodies of Alex Lowe and David Bridges who died in an avalanche on Mt Shishapangma in 1999.

Steck was not only the greatest alpinist in the world but also a good friend of Nepal, senior Captain with Manang Air Ashish Sherchan who flew the alpinist to different locations on Mt Everest recently remembered.

“I can’t express what a loss this is to the mountaineering community, Ueli loved Nepal, Everest and the Himalaya,” renowned climber Alan Arnette commented from Colorado.

According to Durga Datta Dhakal, Director at the Department of Tourism, Ueli’s body was airlifted to Lukla.

Source: The Himalayan Times

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