Bodies of US and Nepali climbers recovered

KATHMANDU: A team of mountaineers has retrieved the bodies of a US climber and her Nepali guide who were killed in an avalanche on Mount Shishapangma in Tibet last year, organizers said Saturday.

Mount Shishapangma is one of the highest mountains in the world, at 8,027 meters (26,335 feet), and is located entirely within Chinese territory. In October last year, an avalanche on the mountain killed two US climbers and their Nepali guides. Nirmal Purja of Elite Exped, a firm that organizes expeditions, said Saturday it had retrieved the bodies of American Anna Gutu and her Nepali guide Mingmar Sherpa.

“Earlier this week, we were able to climb on Shishapangma and were able to bring them down the mountain and cross the border,” he said on Instagram. “From there we brought them to Kathmandu and onward to be reunited with their families.” China has closed Shishapangma expeditions this year, but the Elite Exped team was given a permit for this mission.

The bodies of the other two, American Gina Marie Rzucidlo and her record-holding guide Tenjen “Lama” Sherpa are still missing. Tenjen Sherpa set the record last year for the fastest summit of all 14 of the world’s 8,000-metre (26,000-foot) mountains alongside Norway’s Kristin Harila.

Harila said on Instagram Friday that she was in Nepal for the “search and repatriation” of her climbing partner and Rzucidlo but did not get a permit. “I am so disappointed and feel totally empty in this situation,” she said. “We need a closure. But unfortunately, not now, not this time.”