The 1986 K2 disaster refers to a period from 6 August to 10 August 1986, when five mountaineer

Mountaineering

Mountaineering or mountain climbing is the sport, hobby or profession of hiking, skiing, and climbing mountains. While mountaineering began as attempts to reach the highest point of unclimbed mountains it has branched into specialisations that address different aspects of the mountain and consists...

s died on K2

K2

K2 is the second-highest mountain on Earth, after Mount Everest...

 in the Karakoram

Karakoram

The Karakoram, or Karakorum , is a large mountain range spanning the borders between Pakistan, India and China, located in the regions of Gilgit-Baltistan , Ladakh , and Xinjiang region,...

 during a severe storm. Eight other climbers were killed in the weeks preceding, bringing the total number of deaths to 13.

21 June–4 August 1986

The first casualties of the summer occurred on an American expedition. Like many others that summer, the team hoped to be the first to summit via the technically demanding and the then-unclimbed Southwest Pillar, also known as the "Magic Line." Team leader John Smolich and Alan Pennington were killed in an avalanche on 21 June. Pennington's body was pulled out by climbers who had witnessed the incident, but Smolich has yet to be found. The rest of the team left the mountain shortly after the accident.

On 23 June, French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 climbers Liliane and Maurice Barrard reached the summit, just 30 minutes after their teammate Wanda Rutkiewicz

Wanda Rutkiewicz

Wanda Rutkiewicz was a Polish mountain climber. She was the first woman to successfully summit K2.-Early life:Rutkiewicz was born in Plungė, Lithuania...

 became the first woman to summit K2. Both Rutkiewicz and Barrard were climbing without bottled oxygen. As darkness fell, all three, along with team member Michel Parmentier and two Spanish

Spanish people

The Spanish are citizens of the Kingdom of Spain. Within Spain, there are also a number of vigorous nationalisms and regionalisms, reflecting the country's complex history....

  climbers, Mari Abrego and Josema Casimiro, had to make an emergency bivouac

Bivouac shelter

A bivouac traditionally refers to a military encampment made with tents or improvised shelters, usually without shelter or protection from enemy fire or such a site where a camp may be built. It is also commonly used to describe a variety of improvised camp sites such as those used in scouting and...

 not far from the summit itself. While all six made it through the night, the Barrards disappeared at some point during the descent. Liliane's body was recovered three weeks later but Maurice's was not found until 1998.

Polish

Poles

thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...

 climber Tadeusz Piotrowski

Tadeusz Piotrowski (mountaineer)

Tadeusz Piotrowski was a Polish mountaineer and author of several books related to the subject. He has been referred to as "perhaps the finest winter mountaineer of his day".-Career:...

 fell to his death after a successful summit of the central rib of the south face on 10 July. Six days later Italian soloist Renato Casarotto fell into a crevasse

Crevasse

A crevasse is a deep crack in an ice sheet rhys glacier . Crevasses form as a result of the movement and resulting stress associated with the sheer stress generated when two semi-rigid pieces above a plastic substrate have different rates of movement...

, after an unsuccessful attempt at climbing the Southwest Pillar. He was rescued from the crevasse, but died shortly thereafter. On 3 August, Wojciech Wróż, part of a combined Czech-Polish team that successfully summited the Southwest Pillar without using bottled oxygen, slipped off the end of a fixed rope and fell to his death. On 4 August, Mohammed Ali, Sardar

Sardar

Sardar is a title of Indo-Aryan origin that was originally used to denote feudal princes, noblemen, and other aristocrats. It was later applied to indicate a Head of State, a Commander-in-chief, and an Army military rank...

 for a South Korean expedition, was killed by falling rocks on the Abruzzi Ridge. Difficult weather conditions caused many other injuries and near-fatalities throughout the summer.

6–10 August 1986

Alan Rouse

Alan Rouse

Alan Paul Rouse was the first British climber to reach the summit of the second highest mountain in the world, K2, but died on the descent.-Education:...

 was the leader of a British expedition. He obtained a permit to climb the difficult north-west ridge, instead of the conventional Abruzzi ridge. After several unsuccessful attempts to establish camps on their chosen route, the group disbanded, leaving only Rouse and cameraman Jim Curran on the mountain. Curran returned to Base Camp, but Rouse chose to continue his summit bid.

Rouse's expedition was not the only one facing difficulties that summer on K2. While Rouse and the British expedition attempted the north-west ridge, other expeditions had also been trying various routes, with and without oxygen. After his fellow team members left the mountain, Rouse joined forces with six climbers -- Austria

Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...

ns Alfred Imitzer, Hannes Wieser, Willi Bauer and Kurt Diemberger

Kurt Diemberger

Kurt Diemberger is an accomplished Austrian mountaineer and author of several books.-Career:As of 2008, Kurt Diemberger is the only remaining person alive that made the first ascents on two mountains over 8,000 metres. In 1957, he made the first ascent of Broad Peak and in 1960, the first ascent...

; a Polish woman, Dobroslawa Miodowicz-Wolf; and another British

British people

The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...

 climber, Julie Tullis

Julie Tullis

Julie Tullis was a British climber and film-maker who died on the descent of K2 during a storm along with four other climbers from several expeditions during the 'Black Summer' of 1986.-Early life:...

 -- in an attempt to summit via the conventional route, without a permit.

The newly formed team made it to Camp IV, the final staging post before the summit, but for reasons that are still unclear, the climbers decided to wait a day before making a summit push. Despite deteriorating weather conditions, Rouse and Wolf set out for the summit on 4 August. Wolf quickly tired and dropped back, and Rouse continued alone. Two of the Austrian climbers, Willi Bauer and Alfred Imitzer, caught up with him some 100 vertical meters below the summit. Rouse fell in behind the Austrians and the three reached the summit together at around 4 pm on 4 August. Rouse was the first Englishman to reach the summit of K2.

On the way down, 500 feet below the summit, they found Wolf asleep in the snow and persuaded her to descend. They also met Kurt Diemberger and Julie Tullis, who were still on their way up, and tried unsuccessfully to persuade them to descend. Diemberger and Tullis summited around 7 pm. On the descent, Tullis fell, and though she survived, both she and Diemberger were forced to spend the night bivouac

Bivouac

Bivouac may refer to:* Bivouac Peak, a mountain in the Teton Range, Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming, USA* A military camp** Bivouac shelter** Bivouac sack, or "bivy sack" or bivy bag, an extremely lightweight alternative to traditional tent systems...

ked in the open.

Eventually, all the climbers reached Camp IV and rejoined Hannes Wieser, who had stayed behind. The seven waited for the storm to abate. Instead, the storm worsened, bringing heavy snowfall, winds over 160 km/h, and sub-zero temperatures. With no food and no gas to melt the snow into water, the team members were in imminent peril. At an altitude of 8000 m (26,000 ft) the body requires approximately six litres of fluid/day to avoid dangerous thickening of the blood. Given that the oxygen saturation of the air at this altitude is only a third of that at sea level, the risk of death by hypoxia

Hypoxia (medical)

Hypoxia, or hypoxiation, is a pathological condition in which the body as a whole or a region of the body is deprived of adequate oxygen supply. Variations in arterial oxygen concentrations can be part of the normal physiology, for example, during strenuous physical exercise...

 is great.

Tullis died during the night of 6–7 August, presumably of HAPE (high altitude pulmonary edema), a common consequence of lack of oxygen during physical exertion. The other six climbers stayed at Camp IV for the next three days, but remained barely conscious. On 10 August, the snow stopped, but the temperature dropped and the wind continued unabated. Though weak and severely dehydrated, the remaining climbers decided that they had no other choice but to descend.

Rouse, when conscious, was in agony, and the other climbers had to leave him behind in his tent to save their own lives. It was a decision for which the survivors, particularly Diemberger, would be severely criticized. Imitzer and Wieser, blinded by the snow, collapsed just a few hundred feet from camp and could not be revived. Wolf, who was descending last, never made it back. A year later she was found attached to the fixed ropes by members of a Japanese expedition, still standing upright and leaning against the wall.

Bauer and Diemberger, the two remaining climbers, found that Camp III had been blown away by the hurricane-force winds, but were able to make it to the relative safety of Camp II during the evening of 10 August. Bauer made it to Base Camp under his own power, but Diemberger had to be brought down by Jim Curran and a pair of Polish climbers. Bauer and Diemberger were helicoptered to safety on 16 August. Both lost multiple fingers and toes as a result of severe frostbite.

21 June–4 August

Name	Nationality	Date	Cause of death
John Smolich		21 June	Avalanche Avalanche An avalanche is a sudden rapid flow of snow down a slope, occurring when either natural triggers or human activity causes a critical escalating transition from the slow equilibrium evolution of the snow pack. Typically occurring in mountainous terrain, an avalanche can mix air and water with the...
Alan Pennington
Maurice Barrard		24 June	Disappeared on descent
Lilliane Barrard Lilliane and Maurice Barrard Liliane Barrard and Maurice Barrard were a French couple who made a brief celebrity career climbing at high altitude, mainly in the Himalayan and Karakoram ranges, and emphasising 'Alpine', 'fast and light' style ascents.-Early life:The couple met while climbing in South America, having...
Tadeusz Piotrowski Tadeusz Piotrowski (mountaineer) Tadeusz Piotrowski was a Polish mountaineer and author of several books related to the subject. He has been referred to as "perhaps the finest winter mountaineer of his day".-Career:...		10 July	Fall
Renato Casarotto		16 July	Crevasse fall
Wojciech Wróż		3–4 August	Fall
Muhammed Ali		4 August	Stonefall

6–10 August

Name	Nationality	Date	Cause of death
Julie Tullis Julie Tullis Julie Tullis was a British climber and film-maker who died on the descent of K2 during a storm along with four other climbers from several expeditions during the 'Black Summer' of 1986.-Early life:...		6–7 August	Precise details unknown: edemas, exposure and exhaustion most likely
Alan Rouse Alan Rouse Alan Paul Rouse was the first British climber to reach the summit of the second highest mountain in the world, K2, but died on the descent.-Education:...		10 August
Hannes Wieser
Alfred Imitzer
Dobrosława Miodowicz-Wolf

Books

• Curran, Jim, K2: Triumph and Tragedy, Grafton, 1989, (ISBN 0-586-20569-1)
• Diemberger, Kurt, The Endless Knot: K2, Mountain of Dreams and Destiny, Mountaineers Books, 1991 (ISBN 0-89886-300-7)