AAC Publications - The 8000-er Mess
In recent years an international group of mountaineering researchers came to the realization that there was a major problem with the history of 8,000-meter climbing. The group, which coalesced around Eberhard Jurgalski, the leading chronicler of Himalayan and Karakoram mountaineering statistics, and his 8000ers.com website, determined that on several 8,000-meter peaks, many climbers had not been going to the summit and that this had been happening for decades. Usually this has been because of understandable ignorance or confusion about the exact nature of the summit topography. However, it has led to the remarkable situation where it is possible that no one has stood on the true highest point of all the 8,000-meter peaks.
I feel that I have to state immediately that the summit is the highest point on the mountain and there is usually only one. So, in this article, I don’t say “main summit” or “true summit”—just “summit.” Everything else is a top, a peak, a bump, or a ridge, but not the summit. You might feel that you can stop 30 meters away and 10 meters below the very highest point and still say that you have “climbed the mountain,” but you have not been to the summit.
The questions that have arisen in recent years are not the well-known issues with climbers stopping at the rocky foresummit of Broad Peak or the central peak of Xixabangma (Shishapangma). They involve three other 8,000ers. It has become apparent that only around half the climbers claiming a summit of Annapurna (8,091 meters) had been to the highest point, and that almost all climbers on Manaslu (8,163 meters) had not continued to the summit. There has also been confusion on Dhaulagiri’s summit (8,167 meters). The full dossiers outlining the historical and current issues with these three 8,000ers are available for free at 8000ers.com.
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