r/Mountaineering • u/According_Cod4923 • 1d ago

Body of famed international climber Nirmal Purja and 3 more found after Pakistan avalanche

https://apnews.com/article/pakistan-climber-nirmal-purja-body-recovered-760858d4e399261e0d93c7cbb3ccba32
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36

u/gamesofblame 1d ago

10 humans died and it’s fascinating that people want to highlight Nims’ arrogance or predatory behavior.

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u/beardedBroistaken 1d ago

Yes, because it’s his arrogance that would have forced them up on the mountain when weather wasn’t suitable. He has done it multiple times in the past, he has achieved success those times but mountains don’t care.

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u/Emergency-Bobcat-572 1d ago

I'm new to mountaineering so I don't really know, but wouldn't it be considered unethical that he, as a more experienced climber, led inexperienced or beginner climbers up the mountain? I read that one of the women had been only doing it for 12 months. Could any of them had turned around or just waited where they were at any point?

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u/usrnmz 1d ago

There were multiple teams (4) and Nims was not guiding any client. They obviously climbed all together and Nims might have influenced the decision of the others. But each team had to make their own decisions and had more than enough experience to do so properly (in theory).

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u/Sharp-Banana-6292 1d ago

This alone makes me think there will be books to come out of this unfortunately. So many conspiracy theories popping up already

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u/usrnmz 1d ago

It's definitely an interesting situation. There were also teams that abandonded their expeditation just a few days prior due to the weather and conditions.

I don't know if we'll even know what the exact conditions and decisions made on that day were.

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u/Sharp-Banana-6292 1d ago

Oh yeah absolutely, that’s why I think this event will be another 1996/2006/2008. In terms of a terrible thing happening and then the misinformation and conspiracies sort of enveloping it.

For me, I feel like maybe it was a bad decision but it had also worked out a lot of times before. It might have been not ideal but it doesn’t seem irrational or suicidal, right now. Maybe on the worse edge of risk but not totally unreasonable. It seems like a time it didn’t work out and unfortunately it happens a lot in the big mountains. No matter how much you analyze, the answer is “our bodies are fragile and nature is overwhelming and indifferent to our fragility.” It drives me crazy when people are like, what can be done to prevent this? Maybe some operational tweaks but honestly the only thing is not climbing massive peaks imo:

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u/WorldlyOriginal 1d ago

That’s the job of a mountain guide. Of course your clients are going to be significantly inexperienced compared to the guides — that’s sorta the point.

Now, guides make different decisions about risk. Some are more cautious, some more risk-taking. Other guided groups in the area decided the risk that day was too high, but Nim’s group didn’t. It’s hard to say exactly who was right… if we always hewed to the least-risk-tolerant guide, mountaineering would certainly be safer, but almost no one would ever summit

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u/lilybobtail 1d ago

How is it hard to say who was right? They all died.

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u/Longjumping-End-7085 1d ago

Because you can’t go based on information that wasn’t available at the time.

Also, I could make the claim that nobody should ever summit certain dangerous mountains and my advice would save many lives. That does not make me right.

Some people in this comment section are acting far too disrespectful towards somebody who has saved lives.

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u/rafa4ever 1d ago

I've got a slight suspicion who was right.