New World Record for Climbing World’s Highest Mountains
Kristin Harila climbed the 14 8,000-metres peaks in just over a year. Nirmal "Nims" Purja had claimed the record in just over six months, but had to return to climb to the true summits of two peaks
Norwegian climber Kristin Harila, 37, has completed her objective to climb the 14 peaks above 8,000 metres after summiting Cho Oyu. It took her 12 months and five days. Harila was climbing with Tenjen Sherpa and Ngima Rita Sherpa up the Tibetan side of the mountain.
Harila started with Annapurna on April 28 last year, then climbed Dhaulagiri before moving onto the world’s third highest peak, Kangchenjunga. She then bettered her own record for the Everest/Lhotse linkup by taking just over nine hours to complete both on May 22, having previously climbed them in 12 hours. On May 27, Harila summited Makalu for her sixth in just 29 days. She went on to summit Nanga Parbat on July 1, K2 on July 22, Broad Peak on July 28, Gasherbrum II on Aug. 8, Gasherbrum I on Aug. 11 and Manaslu on Sept. 22. She climbed Shishapangma last Wednesday.
In October 2019, Nirmal “Nims” Purja climbed Shishapangma and completed the 14 8,000-metre mountains in only six months and six days. However, he did not reach the true summits of Manaslu and Dhaulagiri, so had to return in 2021 to do so. He completed all 14 peaks in two years, five months and 15 days. A report by Eberhard Jurgalski here, says “During his big 2019 journey he also stopped, for whatever reason, at the foresummit of Dhaulagiri and later also at the ridge point on Manaslu…. He corrected it in autumn 2021, when he went to the true summits of both mountains. The six months, six days record must be deleted, but he still will own other records.”
Harila reached all true summits completing the 14 peaks in just one year and five days, which makes her the new world record holder. She’s also the second woman to climb to the true summits of the 14 8,000-metre peaks.
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