Poornima Shrestha and Pasang Lhamu Sherpa Akita have made history by becoming the first Nepali women to conquer Mount Dhaulagiri.
The two, part of the team SST-Dhaulagiri I, reached the top of the 8,167-metre peak at approximately 5.30 am on Friday, Seven Summit Treks, the company that organised the expedition, said on its Facebook page.
Shrestha is a photojournalist associated with the national economic daily Karobar while Sherpa is a professional mountaineer. Before the two women conquered the mountain in the wee hours on Friday, no Nepali woman had ever achieved the feat.
For Shrestha, Dhaulagiri is just the latest of many mountaineering achievements. In 2018, she became the first Nepali photojournalist to scale Mount Everest. In April this year, she was one of four Nepali women who successfully reached the top of Mount Annapurna I, making a record of the first-ever ascent of the 10th highest mountain of the world by women climbers.
Shrestha also climbed Mount Manaslu in 2017 and Mount Amadablam in 2019.
Shrestha and Sherpa, along with a team of over 20 climbers, left for the world’s seventh highest mountain on September 18 via Marpha of Mustang district. Shrestha had tried to scale the mountain in May during Nepal’s spring climbing season but was forced to cancel because of an outbreak of the SARS-CoV-2 virus in Myagdi, the district where the mountain is located, and the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic that was battering the entire country at the time.
According to Seven Summit Treks, the team SST-Dhaulagiri I, which included six Nepalis and more than 11 foreign nationals, is the first team to scale Dhaulagiri this autumn mountaineering season.
As per the statistics released by the Department of Tourism, four teams of 28 men and 12 women have obtained permits to climb Dhaulagiri this season. A total royalty of Rs. 4,210,609 has been collected from these expedition teams.
A total of 230 individuals have received permits from the Department to make attempts on six peaks – Manaslu, Dhaulagiri, Mariyang, Kanchenjunga, Kumbhakarna and Putha Himchuli – in the autumn season.
Source : TRN,
