Cho Oyu is the sixth-highest mountain in the world at 8,188 metres (26,864 ft) above sea level. Cho Oyu means "Turquoise Goddess" in Tibetan. The mountain is the westernmost major peak of the Khumbu sub-section of the Mahalangur Himalaya 20 km west of Mount Everest. The mountain stands on the China Tibet–Nepal Koshi Pradesh border.
Dhaulagiri, located in Nepal, is the seventh highest mountain in the world at 8,167 metres (26,795 ft) above sea level, and the highest mountain within the borders of a single country. It was first climbed on 13 May 1960 by a Swiss-Austrian-Nepali expedition. Annapurna I is 34 km (21 mi) east of Dhaulagiri. The Kali Gandaki River flows between the two in the Kaligandaki Gorge, said to be the world's deepest. The town of Pokhara is south of the Annapurnas, an important regional center and the gateway for climbers and trekkers visiting both ranges as well as a tourist destination in its own right.
Sir Christian John Storey Bonington, CVO, CBE, DL is a British mountaineer.
Maurice André Raymond Herzog was a French mountaineer and administrator who was born in Lyon, France. He led the 1950 French Annapurna expedition that first climbed a peak over 8000m, Annapurna, in 1950, and reached the summit with Louis Lachenal. Upon his return, he wrote a best-selling book about the expedition, Annapurna.
Juan Eusebio Oiarzabal Urteaga, commonly known as Juanito Oiarzabal, is a noted Spanish Basque mountaineer. He has written four books on the subject. He was the 6th man to reach all 14 eight-thousander summits, and the third to do so without supplemental oxygen. He was the first person to conquer the top three summits twice and the oldest climber to summit Kangchenjunga, at almost 53, until Carlos Fontan did so in 2014, at 75 years old. In 2004, he lost all his toes to frostbite after summiting K2.
Major Harold William Tilman, CBE, DSO, MC and Bar, was an English mountaineer and explorer, renowned for his Himalayan climbs and sailing voyages.
Tomaž Humar, nicknamed Gozdni Joža, was a Slovenian mountaineer. A father of two, Humar lived in Kamnik, Slovenia. He completed over 1500 ascents, and won a number of mountaineering and other awards, including the Piolet d'Or in 1997 for his Ama Dablam ascent.
Lieutenant Colonel James Owen Merion Roberts MVO MBE MC was one of the greatest Himalayan mountaineer-explorers of the twentieth century; a highly decorated British Army officer who achieved his greatest renown as "the father of trekking" in Nepal. His exploratory activities are comparable to those of Eric Shipton and Bill Tilman.
Ngadi Chuli is a mountain in the Mansiri Himal, also known as the Gurkha Massif, in Nepal. With an elevation of 7,871 metres (25,823 ft) above sea level, it is the 20th-highest mountain on Earth.
Andrew James Lock OAM is an Australian mountaineer. He became the first, and still remains the only, Australian to climb all 14 "eight-thousanders" on 2 October 2009, and is the 18th person to ever complete this feat. He climbed 13 of the 14 without bottled oxygen, only using it on Mount Everest, which he has summited three times. He retired from eight-thousander climbing in 2012.
The Mount Everest Committee was a body formed by the Alpine Club and the Royal Geographical Society to co-ordinate and finance the 1921 British Mount Everest reconnaissance expedition to Mount Everest and all subsequent British expeditions to climb the mountain until 1947. It was then renamed the Joint Himalayan Committee; this latter committee organised and financed the successful first ascent of Mount Everest in 1953.
Major Michael Patrick "Bronco" Lane, MM, BEM was a British Army officer and author, known for his climbing expeditions which led to his summiting Mount Everest in 1976.
Narendra Dhar Jayal (Nandu Jayal) (25 June 1927 – 28 April 1958) was an Indian mountaineer and an officer of the Bengal Sappers and the Indian Army Corps of Engineers. He is credited with pioneering and patronizing early post-Independence mountaineering in India, and was the founder principal of the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute. He encouraged the youth of India to take up mountaineering, and has been called the "Marco Polo of Indian Mountaineering".
Ueli Steck was a Swiss rock climber and alpinist. He was the first to climb Annapurna solo via its South Face, and set speed records on the North Face trilogy in the Alps. He won two Piolet d'Or awards, in 2009 and 2014. Having previously summitted Mount Everest, Steck died on 30 April 2017, after a fall during an acclimatizing climb for an attempt on the Hornbein route on the West Ridge of Everest without supplemental oxygen.
After World War II, with Tibet closing its borders and Nepal becoming considerably more open, Mount Everest reconnaissance from Nepal became possible for the first time culminating in the successful ascent of 1953. In 1950 there was a highly informal trek to what was to become Everest Base Camp and photographs were taken of a possible route ahead. Next year the 1951 British Mount Everest reconnaissance expedition reconnoitred various possible routes to Mount Everest from the south and the only one they considered feasible was the one via the Khumbu Icefall, Western Cwm and South Col. In 1952, while the Swiss were making an attempt on the summit that nearly succeeded; the 1952 British Cho Oyu expedition practised high-altitude Himalayan techniques on Cho Oyu, nearby to the west.
Colonel M W H (Henry) Day, MA, CEng, MICE, Royal Engineers was a British Army Officer who made the first British ascent of Annapurna I. In addition to the first British ascent of Annapurna, he was an active member of the Army Mountaineering Association (AMA) and a member of the Alpine Club (UK) contributing to the Alpine Journal. He was an active climber in the Alps and took part in the first winter ascent of the Grands Charmoz with Rob Collister. He was member of the AMA Tirich Mir (1969) expedition, summiting the peak; the AMA Himachal Pradesh (1973) expedition; the 1976 British and Nepalese Army Expedition to Everest. He led a Royal Engineers expedition to Trisul II (1978) and in 1981 a British Army expedition to the Da Xue Shan mountains in Sichuan province, China attempting to climb Jiaz. In 1987 Henry Day led the climbers attempting to climb the virgin east face of Xixabangma, in China, organised by the Scientific Exploration Society with a view to conducting scientific research en route. In 2008 he organised a climbing expedition to the Georgian Causasus.
The 1976 British and Nepalese Army Expedition to Everest resulted in the successful summit of Mount Everest via its South Face on 16 May. This was the second time this had been achieved – less than a year previously, the 1975 British Mount Everest Southwest Face expedition being the first up the same route. The expedition by the British Army and Royal Nepalese Army was under the command of Tony Streather, and the summiteers were Special Air Service soldiers Bronco Lane and Brummie Stokes.
Subedar Major and Honorary Captain Chhering Norbu Bodh, SC, (retd.) is a retired personnel of the Indian Army, known for his mountaineering achievements while in the army. Bodh holds a number of Indian summiting records related to 8,000m peaks. Among others, he is the first Indian mountaineer to have climbed six of the fourteen 8000m peaks in the world, and the first Indian to stand atop Lhotse and Annapurna-1.
