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Renowned climber Nirmal Purja's body recovered from Broad Peak days after fatal avalanche
The ground team will bring the recovered bodies down to the Japanese camp.
The body of renowned Nepalese-British climber Nirmal Purja was recovered by rescuers on Sunday, three days after he and nine other climbers were swept away in an avalanche on Broad Peak in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir's Gilgit-Baltistan.
The mountain is the world's 12th-highest and is considered one of the most challenging peaks to climb.
The Alpine Club of Pakistan (ACP) said the 43-year-old mountaineer's body was found at an altitude of around 5,700 metres, PTI news agency reported. “The ground rescue team has reached Nims Dai (Purja) at approximately 5,700m on Broad Peak -- a mountain he loved, and a mountain that has now taken him from us,” the club said in a post on social media, adding that three additional bodies were found at the altitude.
The ground team will bring the recovered bodies down to the Japanese camp, ACP said, adding that rescue efforts continue under extremely difficult terrain conditions, PTI reported. The ACP said that apart from the mountain terrain, the risk of avalanches and steep slopes are also posing challenges to the rescue efforts. Helicopters cannot be deployed owing to rough weather conditions, it added.
Four bodies recovered, one additional body located at higher location
Purja was leading the expedition with nine other climbers – five from Nepal, one Pakistani, one Omani, one American and one Chinese.
ACP general secretary Ayaz Shigri said a ground rescue team was transporting four bodies – including those of Purja, two other Nepali nationals and a Chinese citizen – down from the mountain, AFP reported. Shigri added that rescuers had also confirmed the presence of one additional body at a significantly higher elevation. However, he said a recovery attempt at this stage was unlikely owing to “the extremely hazardous terrain and prevailing conditions.”
Earlier on Saturday, Purja's expedition company, Elite Exped, said all ten members of the group were confirmed to have died.
Four of the ten bodies were recovered on Friday. Three of them were identified as Oman's Nadhira Ahmed Abdullah Al Harthy, Nepal's Pur Bahadur Gurung and American Mallory Geis, ACP President Major General Irfan Arshad said. The bodies were airlifted to Skardu.
‘Being a Gurkha was my only dream…’: Nirmal Purja
Mountaineer Nirmal Purja was Nepali by birth, British by nationality and a soldier by training. However, among all his identities, he was most proud of his ancestral heritage that was a common thread in all of it — that he was a Gurkha.
“Being a Gurkha was my only dream… It was the only thing I wanted to do,” he wrote in his book. Gurkha is a name used for certain hill communities in Nepal and India, historically designated as a “martial race”, famed for fierce loyalty and unmatched bravery.
The climber, nicknamed ‘Nims Dai’ (Nepali for ‘older brother’), was a former soldier in the British army that continues to specially recruit Gurkhas — as do the Indian and Nepali armies.
Purja had climbed the world’s 14 highest peaks within a record 189 days in 2019, a feat showcased in the Netflix documentary ‘14 Peaks: Nothing is Impossible’. Born on July 25, 1983, in Dana village in Myagdi district of Nepal, he came from a family with a long history of military service, according to The Kathmandu Post.
He had started his climbing career with a 2012 trek planned for the Everest Base Camp, and summitted Mount Everest for the first time in 2016. In 2019, he started his big push for what became the documentary ‘14 Peaks’. “I gave up my job in the United Kingdom. I gave up my pension and sold my house for this high-altitude, high-speed quest,” Purja told reporters at the time, The Kathmandu Post reported.
