Achieving new
In a first successful Indian civilian expedition the mountaineers associated with Pune based Giripremi reached two eight thousander peaks—Mount Lhotse and Mount Everest—at a time on May 16. The team returned Pune on May 28. Mt Lhotse, located on the border between Tibet and the Khumbu region of Nepal, is the fourth highest peak on earth after Mount Everest (8,848 m), K2 (8,611 m) and Kanchenjunga (8,586 m). It is connected to Everest via the South Col.
After the remarkable achievement in ‘Pune Everest 2012’ expedition; to put forward one more step, Team Giripremi departed at 8:00am on March 21 for their next Himalayan endeavour. This time the team planned to climb two eight thousander peaks—world’s highest mountain Mt. Everest (8,848M) and world’s 4th highest mountain Mt. Lhotse (8,516M). Under the leadership of Shri Umesh Zirpe the team consisted of Ganesh More, Anand Mali, Ashish Mane, Tekraj Adhikari, Bhushan Harshe and Ajit Tate.
The team which left Pune on March 21 halted for a brief period in New Delhi and Kathmandu after which they started their trek in the last week of March. After beating more than 50km over 15 days and traversing up and down the altitude graph from as low as 5,000ft to as high as 18,000ft, the team finally reached Everest Base Camp on April 12. After acclimatisation on the mountain the team was ready for the Summit attempt by second week of May.
On May 12, the team started their Summit attempt from the Everest Base Camp. Traversing through Khumbu Icefall, Camp1, Western Cwm, Camp 2, Lhotse Face and Camp3, they reached the Summit Camp of Mt. Lhotse and Mt. Everest on May 15. The team experienced heavy winds on the Summit Camp. Ashish Mane stepped out of his summit tent at 2.30am on May 16 in adverse weather condition and reached the Main Summit of Mt. Lhotse at 7.20 am.
The Everest team meanwhile couldn’t find a way to launch Summit bid that night. The wind at South Col was too much for any movement. They kept waiting for the wind to stop blowing. The weather bettered since then and finally the team of Anand Mali, Ganesh More and Bhushan Harshe started their Summit attempt at 8.30 pm on May 16 from South Col. They climbed to Balcony and continued towards South Summit. After climbing challenging Hillary Step the team stepped on the Summit of the Mt. Everest today at 8.00am. The team experienced high winds throughout the climb.
On May 16, Umesh Zirpe, leader of the expedition, took a decision to return from South Col and abandon his Summit attempt. He wanted to make sure that his team will have sufficient oxygen bottles for their delayed stay at South Col and the Summit attempt that followed. It was a brave decision by Umesh in favour of the success of the expedition which will set an example of the true team spirit and leadership. He returned to Camp 2 on May 16. At the time of writing of this report the Summit team was on its way back to Camp 3. They are facing major challenge of overexertion, dehydration and high winds en-route.
Giripremi was helped in this endeavour by the LIC of India, Havare Group, NIVEA, Guardian Corporation, Pinnacle Group, CUBIX India Limites, PN Gadgil and Sons, Ascent Realtors, Dajikaka Gadgil Developers, Opus Software, Vidya Valley, Palande Couriers, United India Insurance, Indus Health, Deeksha Exports Pvt Ltd., and many individuals. (FOC)
Giripremi is a pioneer mountaineering club in India formed in 1982 by five stalwarts in mountaineering—Smt. Ushaprabha Page, Anand Palande, Dilip Nimbalkar, Nandu Page and Shashi Hiremath. The objective behind forming the club was to provide a platform to adventure lovers and carving them into new generations of mountaineers. It is among few non-commercial organisations in India whose sole aim is to carry out hardcore mountaineering activities in Sahyadri as well as Himalayas.
Since its inception, Giripremi has been achieving new heights and new horizons, and has gained technical expertise in rock climbing and ice climbing by scaling difficult Himalayan giants. Its achievements include successful ascent on 22 technically challenging Himalayan peaks, including first successful Indian civilian ascents of Mt. Satopanth (7,075 m) and Mt. Shivling (6,450 m).Giripremi’s member Surendra Chavan reached “the top of the world”, summit of Mt. Everest, in first ever successful Indian Civilian expedition: “Tata Everest 1998”. Apart from these extra-ordinary achievements in the Himalaya, Giripremi’s rock climbers climbed several virgin pinnacles and rock walls in the Sahyadri region such as Dhakoba wall (1,500 ft), Katra Kada (2,700 ft), Nafta (2,700 ft) and Aurthor’s seat (1,200 ft).
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