K2
The mighty K2 is the second-highest mountain on Earth after the Mount Everest, which has a peak elevation of 8,611 meters (28,251 feet). This mesmerizing mountain is part of the Karakoram Range located on the border between Gilgit, in Gilgit-Baltistan (Pakistan) and the Tashkurgan Tajik Autonomous County of Xinjiang (China). It was named K2 in 1852 by a British surveyor named T.G. Montgomerie, with “K“ referring to the Karakoram Range and “2“ as it was the second highest peak ever recorded. With the passage of time, K2 was named Mount Godwin-Austen in the honor of Henry Haversham Godwin-Austen (1834-1923), who was an early British surveyor of this area. However, the name was rejected by the Royal Geographical Society, and therefore never got its due recognition. K2 is one of the most difficult of the fourteen 8,000-meter mountains, requiring technical climbing, imposing harsh weather conditions and posing great threats of avalanches. As of 2014, over 335 climbers have successfully reached K2’s summit, whereas a minimum of 82 people have died.
Nanga Parbat
The Nanga Parbat is the second highest mountain peak of Pakistan and overall it is the ninth highest mountain in the world. The word Nanga Parbat literally means “Naked Mountain,” and it has three gigantic faces. The main peak is 8,126 meters (26,660 feet) above sea level. The second is the Rakhiot face and the third one is the Diamir face which is rock-strewn in the starting but it transforms itself into fields of ice around the Nanga Parbat peak. This third segment of Nanga Parbat is also known as the Rupal face, and it is the highest precipice in the world. The Nanga Parbat is also known as the killer mountain due to the fact that 31 people died while attempting to climb the Nanga Parbat before its first ascent by the Austrian climber Hermann Buhl in 1953. Nanga Parbat is the third-most dangerous 8,000-meter peak with a death rate of 22.3%. As of 2012, there have been at least 68 climber deaths on the Nanga Parbat.
Gasherbrum
The Gasherbrum is a remote faction of peaks located at the northeastern end of the Baltoro Glacier in the Karakoram Range of the Himalayas on the border of the Chinese-administered Shaksgam Valley and the Gilgit-Baltistan territory of Pakistan. This massif contains three of the world’s 8,000 meter peaks, if Broad Peak is also included in it. In 1856, Thomas George Montgomerie, a British Royal Engineers lieutenant and a member of the Great Trigonometric Survey of India, sighted a group of high peaks in the Karakoram from more than 200 kilometers away. He named five of these peaks K1, K2, K3, K4 and K5 where the K denotes Karakoram. Today, K3 is known as Broad Peak, K4 as Gasherbrum II and K5 as Gasherbrum I.
Distaghil Sar
The Distaghil Sar is the highest mountain in the Hispar Muztagh, which is a sub-range of the Karakoram mountain range, in Gilgit-Baltistan. It is the fourth highest mountain peak of Pakistan and overall it is the 19th highest mountain peak on earth. The mountain has a 3 kilometer long top ridge above 7400 meters with three distinct summits: north-west 7885 meters, central 7760 meters and south-east 7696 meters. The Distaghil Sar was first climbed in 1960 by Gunther Starker and Diether Marchart of an Austrian expedition led by Wolfgang Stefan. The expedition climbed the western part of the South face and continued over the southwest ridge to the highest summit. Three years earlier, in 1957, an English expedition had attempted to climb the mountain from the South and the West, but failed due to bad weather. Similarly, bad weather blocked a 1959 Swiss attempt over the southeast ridge. The highest, western summit has been scaled twice since in 1980 and 1982 over the original route. Two attempts over the daunting north face, in 1988 and 1998 were unproductive. The eastern summit was first climbed in 1980 by a Polish expedition over the east face, and it was re-ascended in 1983.
Khunyang Chhish
Khunyang Chhish or Kunyang Chhish is the second-highest mountain in the Hispar Muztagh, a sub-range of the Karakoram Mountains in Pakistan. Its height is 7823 meters and it is the fifth highest mountain peak of Pakistan and 21st highest in the world. It is a steep, pointed and complex peak; it easily rivals the slightly higher Distaghil Sar to the North which has a more rounded shape. The first climbing effort on Khunyang Chhish was made in 1962 but the climb was aborted after an avalanche on the 18th of July killed two climbers, Major James Mills and Captain M. R. F. Jones. Their bodies were never recovered. The next attempt was in 1965 but another climber died after the collapse of a narrow ridge at 7,200 meters (23,600 feet). The first ascent was accomplished by a Polish team led by Andrzej Zawada in 1971. They climbed a long route up the South Ridge of the peak from the Pumari Chhish Glacier. However, one of their members was killed in a crevasse accident. The second, and only other recorded ascent, climbed the Northwest Spur to the North Ridge. Two British climbers, Mark Lowe and Keith Milne, completed this route on July 11, 1988. The route had first been attempted in 1980, and had been attempted again in 1981, 1982, and 1987. After four unsuccessful expeditions, beginning in 2003, the East summit was first ascended in July 2013 by an Austrian/Swiss team over the South Wall.
Contributed by Ahmed Raza.
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