The North Face athletes Simone Moro and David Goettler have cut short their winter attempt of Nanga Parbat following adverse weather conditions on the mountain.
The pair were forced to retreat just 1000m shy of the summit after bitter temperatures and wind speeds of up to 80km/h meant it was too dangerous to continue the climb. The 64 day-long expedition, which formed the North Face Winter Expedition 2014, saw the climbers attempt to scale the world’s ninth highest mountain in the coldest period of the year – a feat which has never yet been achieved. For Simone Moro, this year’s expedition was his second attempt to reach the summit, while Goettler had already scaled 7200m during the winter season.
Known for being a notoriously difficult mountain to climb at 8125m tall, Nanga Parbat or ‘Killer Mountain’ is located in the westernmost part of the Himalaya. Since 1988 there have been 17 attempts to climb the mountain in Winter, but due to such short weather windows these have been without success.
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