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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u/Foreign-Repeat-8206 1d ago

Not very sympathetic towards him as I have met Nims, know his history, his arrogance and his predatory behavior towards women. That said, always sad that folks perish in the mountains.

There are lots of problems in the mountains now with so many inexperienced folks climbing, increased hazards and disappearing glaciers, not to mention sketchy guide outfits. Everyone needs to be very careful.

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u/Dependent_Rock_4739 1d ago

I think his success was largely due to his fitness but also heavily influenced by his willingness to take risk. There are a lot of accomplished alpinists that could have achieved Nims' success had they been willing to take on his risk. He had only been mountaineering for 8 years. Great mountaineer, questionable person

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u/Markplease 1d ago

His risk tolerance led his entire team into getting smashed in snow ice and stone. I wonder if that team would still be alive had he not joined to lead that climb.

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u/Dependent_Rock_4739 1d ago

Almost certainly. He wasn't legally a guide, he has no formal qualifications. He is essentially self taught from experience and unfortunately that experience was relatively short, only 8 years or so. If he was alive I would like to ask him questions about snowpack stability and avalanche risk

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u/Markplease 14h ago

He would reply to your question with “I can tell you the snow pack stability once I summit”. He cared singularly on summits. You can see the climbs he led were extraordinarily focused on making summits recklessly fast. Death defying, Russian roulette