The successful expedition on Broad Peak, the 12th highest peak of the world, has ended by the return of Slovak climbing quartet. Tomáš Rigoci and Jan Doležal are along with Peter Hámor, which has conquered the Annapurna peak on April 27, 2010 the only three Slovak climbers, which have managed to reach the summit of an eight-thousander. We heartily congratulate to both boys and we believe that their “Himalayan career” which started so successfully this summer will continue and that it wasn´t their last adventure taking place on an eight-thousander.
Boys have finally managed to move from Skardu to Islamabad. They are to departure during Wednesday´s night and their landing in the Vienna International Airport is planned on Thursday 1:30 p.m.
Boys have gone through the Gondogoro pass down to the Hushe after they ended their stay under Broad Peak. From Hushe they moved to Skardu where they are now completely isolated from the surrounding world as the Indus River caused massive floods in the area. Karakorum Highway have been closed for 5 days because several bridges have crushed so boys will try to get to Islamabad by an army plane or helicopter.
We have been informed by the text message this morning: “We have descended to the base camp during yesterday´s night. The C3 camp was completely destroyed. Some tents have been blown off, some have been ripped apart. It has been very windy yesterday and it´s very windy today. What a pitty, we have been doing so well.”
The second summit push that Maco and Juraj had started on Saturday came to an end in the C3 camp. Raging of a windstorm has claimed their tent in the C3 camp. They have found the tent in a very bad condition, tattered and unfit for staying overnight so boys have decided to descend back to the base camp.
Weather has finally improved after an endless wait on Saturday morning. As our boys have only few days left and the end of their stay under the peak is drawing near, they immediately started the second summit push. Maco & Ďuro have teamed up with two boys from Spain and two boys from Norway and texted about 2 p.m. that they´ve already reached the C2 camp. Unfortunately, they have to break their way through the great amount of new snow that came down during last days so conditions are quite hard out there.
Boys have been “imprisoned” in the base camp for few days by an unfavorable weather. As the weather is to improve on Saturday, Juraj and Maco plan to climb up to the C2 camp and there they will decide what to do next. One way or another, the C3 camp is still in his place too and needs to be "brought down".
Boys have spent three days in the base camp. A very awful weather reigns so boys wait for the weather to improve so they could climb up one last time. This time they plan to collect material “scattered” through the peak. The forecast says that the weather should improve on Friday.
Juraj texted about the situation in the base camp: "Tomáš and Jano have just arrived to the base camp. They don´t want to go to the disco and I don´t know why. But they are OK; to be precise we are all OK" :)
After he climbed the main summit of Broad Peak during Saturday´s evening climb, Jano has spent night in the altitude of 7.800 meters and reached the C3 camp on Sunday´s noon or so. Tomáš stayed with him in the C3 camp overnight as Jano was exhausted and wasn´t able to descend down to the base camp. They both plan to climb down to the base camp tomorrow.