South Expedition Members (18); Alessandro Mario Busca, Michele Compagnoni, Marco Confortola, Paolo Confortola, Giuliano De Marchi, Soro Dorotei, Massimo Farina, Marco Forcatura, Ugo Giacomelli, Leandro Giannangeli, Adriano Greco, Enrico Lazzeri, Mario Merelli, Sergio Minoggio, Silvio Mondinelli, Nadia Tiraboschi, Karl Unterkircher, Stefano Zavka.
Expedition leader; Agostino Da Polenza

www.montagna.org
Gnaro Mondinelli

North Expedition Members: (9): Fabio Agostinis, Claudio Bastrentaz, Romano Benet, Daniele Bernasconi, Agostino Cittadini, Paolo Comune, Nives Meroi, Mario Panzeri, Luca Vuerich.
Expedition leader; Agostino Da Polenza

www.montagna.org

Edurne Pasaban for K2 

Edurne's expedition is part of the Al Filo de lo Imposible, the Spanish Television series "To the Edge of the Impossible". The expedition will not only climb the mountain, but also add to its difficulty by documenting it for television. To make this happen, the program has accumulated some of the most prestigious names in Spain: At the forefront, Juanito Oiarzabal, the 8000+ summit record (20) holder, and also Ferrán Latorre, Juan Vallejo and Mikel Zabalza.

With the 50 year first summit celebration this year, only from Spain, almost ten expeditions are preparing to attempt the summit; teams from the Canary Islands, Andalusia, and Madrid (including an expedition led by veteran Carlos Soria, who will try to make the summit at 65 years old).

Edurnepasaban.net (Spanish)

The South West Pillar of K2, dubbed "The Magic Line" in a widely publicized pre-expedition tour. Reinhold Messner took one look at this route in 1979, called it "suicidal", and switched to the normal Abruzzi route. It was climbed in 1986 by a Polish team, and is still the hallmark of "suicidal" excellence, with exceptionally hard, steep sections of icy rock at very high altitudes.

The head of the expedition is Oscar Cadiach, who has done 5 expeditions to Everest, 2 of which reached the summit. Cadiach has climbed Nanga Parbat, and opened the route 'Free Tibet' on Cho Oyu and a new route on Broad Peak central. He has also climbed Shisha Pagma, Makalu and Lhotse.

Team members also include Manel de la Matta has climbed Cho Oyu and Shisha Pagma. Jordi Tosas descended Cho Oyu on a snowboard. Jordi Corominas has climbed Daulagiri alone. And Valentí Giró.

www.guiasbenasque.com

Surviving K2 with Inaki Ochoa de Olza

Iñaki Ochoa de Olza (Pamplona, 1967), has been devoted to high altitude climbing since a very young age: he summited Mont Blanc at 17 years old, and almost made it to the top of Kanchenjunga at 22! That experience made him to focus on Himalayan peaks and eighthousanders, as an independent climber or as a high altitude guide working for commercial expeditions. Now he is involved in completing the 14 8000+, having summited eight of them.

This April he summited Makalu. Before that, he reached the summit of Cho Oyu twice (1993 and 2001), GI (1996), GII (1996), Lhotse (1999), Everest (2001), Nanga Parbat (2003) and Broad Peak (2003). He has also summited Shisha Pangma Central (1995).

He will be climbing an undetermined route on K2 along with Jorge Palacio, Emilio Vicente and Alex Txicon.

www.navarra8000.com

The Mountaineering Team will be climbing K2 this summer. If successful they will be the first Chinese to summit K2. In 2002, the same Chinese expedition team climbed to 8,400 meters but turned back due to bad weather. The China Tibet Mountaineering Team, set up in 1993, has ascended 12 8,000ers, K2 and Gasherbrum I remain. The team is led by Sangzhub and has a permit for 13 climbers.
 

After last years attempt on K2, six-time 8000m peak summiteer Karl (Kari) Kobler returns this year to lead an expedition up the Abruzzi Spur route with high-altitude porters, fixed ropes and oxygen for the climb.

www.kobler-partner.ch

"The weather continues to worsen and remains unpredictable. A successful summit seems therefore improbable and/or impossible. Large powder avalanches descend into the valley again and again. A ‘summit resignation’ slowly forms in Base Camp; overall, morale is high and the supply of red wine provides for additional well-being.

With the conditions of this year we also do not see the sense to dare an attempt on K2. The chances of being able to climb past the Bottleneck are more than small. With heavy hearts we decide to break the expedition off and move on our way south over the Godogoro La."

The Team: Roman Dirnböck (Salzburg), Gernot Lachmaier (Salzburg), Michael Pichler (Tirol), Peter Plattner (Tirol), Werner Schallhart (Tirol), Walter Würtl (Tirol), Walter Zörer (Tirol, Expedition Leader).

www.8000x2.at

Teodor Tulpan and Horia Colibasanu came to Pakistan as a part of the ATP international expedition and their goal is to climb K2. They were supposed to meet Gheorghe Dijmarescu but he couldn't get to Pakistan as originally planned.

Horia is a member of the "CS Alternative Timisoara" climbing & mountaineering club. He is a dentist and practices climbing and mountaineering since 1998. Since then he was on several expeditions as follows: The Caucasus in '98 and '02 where he reached Gumachi (3843) and Elbrus (5648) and a failed attempt on Ushba. The Tian Shan range in '99 where he reached Khan Tengri (7010) along with Teodor Tulpan (Fane). Teodor was on his second ascent on Khan Tengri since a few days earlier he reached the summit with his paraglider and wanted to fly out from the summit but bad winds didn't allow it so he left the paraglider there and summited again a few days later with Horia trying again but still bad weather prevented the fly so he descended to 6800m from where he took of. Last year Horia summited the Matterhorn via the Italian Ridge after waiting for three days for good weather in the Carell hut.

Fane (Teodor Tulpan) summited Everest in 2003 as a member of the Romanian expedition. He summited Khan Tengri and one of the 7000+ peaks in the Pamir range, Peak Communism. He was in several Caucasus Expeditions also. He works as a Mountain Rescuer in the Fagaras Mountains, Romania.
 

www.xsports.ro

Nanga Parbat - 8125m

Jörg Stingl, Günter Jung (oldest at 65, died on descent), Christian and Markus Walter (all Germans) summited June 18 between 10:00am to 12:00noon.

The team chose the Diamir Face for this year’s attempt. Expedition leader Christian Walter led the club's first 8,000m expedition to Nanga Parbat in 1993. The team attempted the classical Rakhiot (Buhl) Route, but did not make the summit. 11 years later, Christian made good on his vow to return. Joining him this year was his brother Markus (who has climbed four 8000ers), Joerg Stingl, the second German to climb Everest without oxygen, and Jens Triebel and Carsten Beichler, who each have made first ascents on rock climbs in Brooks Range and Grade X sport climbs. Rounding out the team was 65 year-old Guenter Jung, who has 40 years of climbing experience and several 7,000m peaks.

www.alpinclub.com (German)

http://www.amical.de

Nanga Parbat - Winter 04/05

Broad Peak - 8051m

Alfred Schreilechner returned to K2 this year for a BP/K2 double header. He attempted K2 last year with partner Sylvain Geneau and Claude Andre Nadon (who had to drop out from this year's climb), but like other expeditions, found unstable weather and unsafe route conditions.

Alfred's website

Field Touring Alpine 

FTA HQ in Perth, Western Australia has announced that their Karakorum8000 website is up and running. The first expedition climbs get underway from June 16. The site will be updated every 24-48 hrs

Field Touring Alpine is an Australian expedition and guiding company, founded by Dave Hancock. The company will be leading a guided expedition up GII’s South West Ridge Route this summer as well as Broad Peak and Spantik.


Expedition leader: Jamie McGuiness (NZ)
Expedition members: Malte Hagge (AUS) Olivier Dufresne (France) Amanda Padoan (USA) Dennis Charrier (France) Haruki Inokuchi (Japan)  Fabien Anselmet (France)  Yannick Faure (France)  Pierre Olivier Wolter (France)  Amir (Chilly) Cuturic (Bosnia Herz)  Mike Farris (USA)  Gordon Ferguson (USA)  Taqui Mohammed (PAK).

www.fieldtouring.com

Dutch Broad Peak   

A Dutch team made up of Frits Vrijlandt, Rozemarijn Janssen, Menno Boermans, and Bob de Kort are going for Broad Peak this summer of 2004. Frits was the first Dutchman to summit Mount Everest from the North and the fifth to do so altogether; he’s also completed the seven summits, Carstensz version. Rozemarijn Janssen was the first and only Dutch woman to summit Carstensz and Vinson.
Expedition members: Frits Vrijlandt, Rozemarijn Janssen, Menno Boermans, and Bob de Kort.

Expedition website (Dutch)

Adventure Consultants Broad Peak

www.adventureconsultants.co.nz

Gasherbrum l (Hidden Peak) - 8080m

GI/GII Carlos Pauner Double Ascent 

Carlos Pauner, summiter of four 8000m peaks, (including Kangchenjunga last May, an expedition on which he nearly lost his life and suffered the loss fingers and toes to frostbite) is returning to the mountains this Spring with trips to both Gasherbrum I and II.

www.carlospauner.com (Spanish)

Diego Giovannini, 41, has climbed Aconcagua (6959 m), Kilimanjaro (5895 m) and Cho Oyu (8201m). He plans to climb GI along the South East Spur and GII up the South East Wall in alpine style, without the use of high altitude porters or supplemental O's.

soloperun8000.it

Iztok Tomazin, Andrej Tercelj and Stojan Burnik (team leader, Cho Oyu 1995) intend to ski down from Gasherbrum II. Together with Marko Car, Tomazin in 1995, made a ski descent from Gasherbrum I via the North wall. He has also ascended Dhaulagiri in 1987, Cho Oyu in 1988, Shisha Pangma Central-Peak in 1993 and Gasherbrum I in 1995.

Iztok Tomazin's objective is to climb alone or with other climbers on a new route on Gasherbrum I, if there is enough time left after the G2 ascent and ski descent.

Irena Mrak's objective is to make a direct crossing from Gasherbrum II to Gasherbrum I. gasherbrum.extremekanal.com/

GI/GII Carlos Pauner Double Ascent 

Carlos Pauner, summiter of four 8000m peaks, (including Kangchenjunga last May, an expedition on which he nearly lost his life and suffered the loss fingers and toes to frostbite) is returning to the mountains this Spring with trips to both Gasherbrum I and II.

www.carlospauner.com (Spanish)

GII – Tortosa 8000 

A 5-member Catalan team comprised of one woman and four men will climb GII this June following
the classic Moravec route along the southwest spur. It is the first 8,000m expedition from Terres de l’Ebre and commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Union Excursionista of Catalonia of Tortosa.

Expedition Members - Leader, Joan Josep Tirón i Ferré, Nacho Bou Palmés, Víctor Navarro Camisón, Manel Navarro Andreu, and Natàlia Lanau Franch.

www.uectortosa.org (Catalan)

GII Field Touring Alpine 

Field Touring Alpine is an Australian expedition and guiding company, founded by Dave Hancock. The company will be leading a guided expedition up GII’s South West Ridge Route this summer.

Expedition Leader: Mike Hale (US)
Expedition members: Steven Hay (AUS), Ernestine (Tin) Tjepkema (AUS), Dale Brearley (UK),Waite Thomas (UK)

fieldtouring.com

Benegas Brothers for new route in Karakorums

Damian and Willie (Guillermo) Benegas, born in Argentina and living in the USA, have raised the attention of the climbing community since they were very young, and started opening routes in their homeland, mostly in Patagonia and Aconcagua. Then they extended their action field to the rest of Andes, did severe rock-climbing in big walls such as El Capitan (Yosemite) and soon headed for the Himalayas. They own a guiding company.

Last year they were the first to climb the North Pillar of Nuptse, resulting in a new route opened in alpine style after a non-stop six day long climb, and named ‘Crystal Snake’. This summer, they are moving to the Karakoram Range, where they will try to be the first to climb the North Ridge of Latok I.

patagonianexpd.com