Autumn 2014 | Makalu SE Ridge Summit Push; Video from Lhotse South Face

Excessive snow on Makalu's normal route forced all climbers to retreat. However, the British team is reporting good conditions from Southeast Ridge. They are likely to leave for the summit from C4, tonight. There hasn’t been any update from Korean team, who were on the way to set up C4 on Lhotse South Face. Meanwhile, the home-team of Koreans has published a compilation of video footages from the expedition, majorly covering the massive avalanches on this notorious mountain wall.

Makalu
British tri-services team’s progress on SE Ridge has been led by a group of Sherpa, who established C3 on Monday. Yesterday, they worked on the route to C4. It's hoped that two members and four Sherpa would have made it to C4 earlier today, and they shall launch the summit push at night. In today's dispatch Base Camp, the expedition leader wrote.

This morning the summit team set off to establish camp four and stay there the night for a planned early next morning attempt at the summit. The summit team radioed in this morning to report they were in good form and with the weather window holding good for the next three days were optimistic for having a good crack at it.

C2 on Makalu SE Ridge; Source

On normal route, the bad conditions didn't let the climber go above C2. “We felt it unreasonable to press on in such difficult / dangerous conditions, so have called off our climb. Currently we are packing up our base camp and preparing to head out in a few days.” Garret Madison wrote on Tuesday.

Lhotse
Lhotse South Face is steep, difficult and dangerous. Korean expedition led by Hong Sung Taek has been working on the mountain since the start of September. Prolonged bad weather, excessive snow and frequent avalanches have made the climb further demanding. The team has now published a compilation of video footages (in Korean language) from the expedition. Watch the interesting movie "Surviving Avalanches" here.

Prior to bad weather stimulated by cyclone Hudhud, Koreans had established C3 at 7500m. They were planning to install a final camp C4 at 8200m before summit bid. However, there hasn't been any update from the team, recently.

Koreans on Lhotse South Face; Photo: Outdoor News

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