Czech climber Klara Kolouchova dies on Nanga Parbat

A renowned Czech mountaineer has died while climbing Nanga Parbat, amongst the 14 peaks that are over 8,000 metres in altitude, an official of the Alpine Club of Pakistan said here on Friday.

Klara Kolouchova, 46, fell from a height between Camp I and Camp II in the early hours of Thursday, around 4:00 am, near Bunar Base Camp of the 8,125 metres peak in Diamer area of Gilgit-Baltistan region of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK).

Nanga Parbat has earned the moniker of a 'Killer Mountain' in the mountaineering community due to its reputation of regularly exacting high numbers of human fatalities.

Karrar Haidri, vice president, Alpine Club of Pakistan, said Klara, an accomplished mountaineer, globally recognised as the first Czech woman to summit both Mt Everest and K2, had arrived in Pakistan on June 15 and was accompanied by her husband and five team members.

After she fell from a height between Camp I and Camp II, “authorities and rescue teams were immediately alerted and dispatched. Recovery efforts are currently underway to locate and retrieve her body from the fall site,” Haidri said in a message on WhatsApp.

He didn’t give any reason for the fall but some local media reports said possibly her gas-cylinder exploded causing the mishap.

Nanga Parbat, which derives its name from the Sanskrit words ‘nagna’ and ‘parvata,’ meaning “naked mountain” is the ninth-highest mountain in the world, and earned the grim moniker due to the high number of fatalities.

More than 95 climbers have died so far while trying to scale the peak, including 31 who died before it was first scaled in 1953. It also suffered a terrorist attack when Taliban militants stormed and killed 10 foreign climbers on June 23, 2013.