Dash to the summit

May 29 is the 70th anniversary of the first ascent of Mt Everest by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953. So far, 2023 has been a season of new records with more than 1,000 mountaineers attempting 25 peaks. Everest has more than half of those climbers, and there have been 11 fatalities on the peak. 

20 years ago this week, Nepali Times marked the 50th anniversary of the event with special coverage. That year, too, saw a record number of climbers dashing to the summit before the weather window closed. Among them were the sons of Hillary and Tenzing.

Excerpts from the page 1 report published in issue #146 23-29 May 2003: 

If Thursday was anything to go by, this will be a wild week on Sagarmatha in the run-up to 29 May, the 50th anniversary of the first ascent of the world’s highest mountain. 

After days of fierce winds, nearly 150 climbers from 25 expeditions have been moving up the mountain from the Nepali side, and 30 expeditions from the north. Till presstime Thursday, some 26 Nepalis and 11 international climbers got to the top from the south. 

In the coming days, more expeditions will be making summit bids—traffic and weather permitting. There are the South Africans, trying to put the first black woman on the summit, the Italian speed expedition is acclimatising and moving up to the South Col and the 50-strong French expedition is planning to go for the top in two groups this week. Most expeditions have been sharing Sherpas to fix ropes while they wait for the weather window to make the dash to the summit.  

From archive material of Nepali Times of the past 20 years, site search: www.nepalitimes.com