By Staff Reporter
GILGIT: Record-setting Nepali mountaineer Nirmal Purja has died after an avalanche struck an expedition on Pakistan’s Broad Peak, his expedition company confirmed on Saturday, in a disaster that also killed one of Oman’s most accomplished climbers.
Elite Exped, the company Purja co-founded and which organised the expedition, said the 43-year-old was among a 10-person international team caught in the avalanche while attempting to scale the 8,047-metre (26,401-foot) peak on Thursday. “It is with profound sadness and immense heartbreak that we confirm that Nirmal ‘Nimsdai’ Purja tragically lost his life following the avalanche on Broad Peak,” the company said in a statement posted on Instagram. “We have also received confirmation that other members of the expedition sadly did not survive.”
The dead also included Omani mountaineer Nadhira Ahmed Abdullah Al Harthy, the first Omani woman to summit Mount Everest and the first Omani, of either sex, to climb both K2 and Nanga Parbat. Her body was recovered on Friday, along with those of Nepali climber Pur Bahadur Gurung and American climber Mallory Geis, and flown by helicopter to hospital for formal identification, the Gilgit-Baltistan government said.
Elite Exped named two further colleagues among those killed alongside Purja: Gurung, known to friends as “Yukta”, and a guide identified as Nima Sherpa. The company said it was mourning not only Purja but “every life lost in this tragedy,” while asking for privacy for the families of those killed. It thanked Pakistani search-and-rescue teams and said it would make no further comment beyond information confirmed by the relevant authorities.
A record-breaker who championed Nepali climbers
Purja was celebrated worldwide after climbing all 14 of the world’s mountains above 8,000 metres in a record six months and six days in 2019, a feat later chronicled in the Netflix documentary 14 Peaks: Nothing Is Impossible. A former member of Britain’s Brigade of Gurkhas who went on to join the Special Boat Service of the Royal Marines, he became one of the most influential figures in Himalayan mountaineering, leading commercial expeditions while championing Nepali climbers on the global stage.
His death has resonated as widely across the Gulf as it has in the climbing world. Al Harthy had become a symbol of Oman’s growing presence in high-altitude mountaineering, and her ascents of some of the world’s most demanding peaks had earned her widespread recognition at home and across the region.
Nepal’s prime minister, Balendra Shah, led tributes to Purja and the other climbers, describing their deaths as “tragic” and saying the news “has shocked us”. “The physical journey of all the deceased climbers… has been interrupted, but the history of their courage, dedication, and contributions will always remain inspiring,” he said in a statement on social media.
Search continues in “extremely challenging” conditions
Pakistani authorities said military helicopters and experienced civilian climbers were continuing the search on Saturday, in what officials described as a second day of operations after efforts were paused a day earlier due to difficult weather. Rescue teams had spent Friday scouring the mountainside and remained at base camp overnight to resume the search at first light.
“The rescue operation is being conducted under extremely challenging terrain and high-altitude weather conditions by the Pakistani army in coordination with local high-altitude climbers and rescuers,” the Gilgit-Baltistan government said.
Poor weather and difficult terrain have repeatedly hampered rescue efforts in one of the world’s most inhospitable mountain environments.
The avalanche struck while the mountaineers were climbing at an altitude of around 6,600 metres on Thursday, according to regional authorities. The expedition comprised ten people in total: Purja, five other Nepali climbers, a Pakistani guide, Al Harthy, Geis and a climber from China.
The team was last in contact on Thursday morning, with reports of the avalanche emerging that evening. Tracking devices carried by the climbers revealed the scale of the disaster. “Data from their tracking devices indicates that they were thrown hundreds of metres down the mountainside,” Naila Kiani, of Pakistan’s Alpine Club, told Le Monde.
Fida Ali, a climber who had worked closely with Purja since 2023, told AFP that the team’s focus for the season had been on summiting Broad Peak, having first tackled another peak, G2, in harsh weather. Ali had joined the early stages of the Broad Peak expedition himself but turned back to accompany a Russian climber who was struggling with exhaustion — a decision that spared him from the avalanche that followed.
“I wanted to go with him but couldn’t, and came back with her. I was part of the team but survived,” he said.
A record chaser to the last
Purja had written on social media this week that he was close to becoming the first person to climb all 14 “super peaks” twice without supplemental oxygen. “Broad Peak, I ask for nothing but safe passage up and back down,” he wrote, days before the mountain claimed his life.
Broad Peak, the world’s 12th-highest mountain, lies near K2 in Pakistan’s northern Karakoram range. The region attracts elite climbers from around the world but is notorious for avalanches, rapidly changing weather and the extreme risks of high-altitude climbing. It was first summited in 1957 by an Austrian team.
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