Gasherbrum II

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Lore & Background

In 1856, Thomas George Montgomerie, a member of the British Royal Engineers and part of the Great Trigonometric Survey, sighted the mountain and named it "K4", meaning the fourth mountain of Karakoram. The name "Gasherbrum" comes from the Balti words rgasha ("beautiful") and brum ("mountain"). Contrary to popular belief, it does not mean "shining wall", which is how Sir William Martin Conway described nearby Gasherbrum IV on an 1892 exploration. The mountains of the Gasherbrum group were explored in 1909 by the Duke of the Abruzzi and Vittorio Sella. In 1934, Günter Dyhrenfurth and his International Himalayan Expedition, including André Roch, explored Gasherbrum I and II, making it 6,250 metres (20,510 ft) up Gasherbrum II. The first ascent came on July 7, 1956, by Austrians Fritz Moravec, Josef Larch and Hans Willenpart by the Southwest Ridge. After they set up Camp I, they had to descend, and found the camp—and all their supplies and food—buried by an avalanche when they returned. Despite this, they decided to make a quick summit attempt. After opening up a route, they left Camp III on July 6. The group spent the night in a bivouac sack and reached the top at 11:30 am the next day.

Reader's Guide

Gasherbrum II is located on the border of Gilgit–Baltistan, Pakistan, and Xinjiang, China in the Karakorum range, at the top of the Baltoro Glacier. With an elevation of 8,034 metres (26,358 ft) it is the third-highest member of the Gasherbrum group, behind Gasherbrum I (8,080 metres or 26,510 feet) and Broad Peak (8,051 metres or 26,414 feet). Gasherbrum III is sometimes considered to be a subpeak of Gasherbrum II, because the former has a topographic prominence of only 461 metres (1,512 ft). Climbing history includes the first alpine-style summit on August 3, 1981, by Swiss Mountaineers Romolo Nottaris and Tiziano Zünd. On July 24, 1982, Reinhold Messner, along with Nazir Sabir and Sher Khan, climbed the peak via the Southwest Ridge. In July 1984, Reinhold Messner and Hans Kammerlander reached both Gasherbrum II and Gasherbrum I without returning to base camp, in alpine style. In August 1984, a French expedition led by Daniel Croisot reached the summit and achieved the integral first descent by ski of Gasherbrum II. In August 1986, Gasherbrum II was successfully ascended by a Slovene expedition in only 32 hours from the base to the peak. In 1997 Anatoli Boukreev achieved a solo speed ascent, camp ABC (5800 metres) to summit in 9 hours 30 min. On February 2, 2011, Cory Richards, Denis Urubko, and Simone Moro made the first winter ascent of Gasherbrum II, despite being buried by a class-four avalanche. On July 19, 2023, Andrzej Bargiel made the highest descent from Gasherbrum II on skis, summiting without supplemental oxygen and skiing from 26,362 feet.

Did You Know?

• Gasherbrum II was originally surveyed as K4 by Thomas George Montgomerie in 1856, meaning the fourth mountain of Karakoram.
• The name Gasherbrum comes from Balti words rgasha ('beautiful') and brum ('mountain'), not 'shining wall' as commonly believed.
• The first ascent team found their Camp I buried by an avalanche, yet still pressed on to summit on July 7, 1956.
• The first winter ascent on February 2, 2011, by Cory Richards, Denis Urubko, and Simone Moro, occurred despite them being buried by a class-four avalanche.
• Andrzej Bargiel made the highest ski descent from Gasherbrum II on July 19, 2023, skiing from 26,362 feet without supplemental oxygen.