Kathmandu: Three days after he went missing following a massive avalanche, the body of renowned Nepalese-British mountaineer Nirmal Purja was recovered by rescuers on Sunday.
Nirmal and nine others were swept away in the avalanche on Broad Peak in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir’s Gilgit-Baltistan.
The 43-year-old mountaineer’s body was found at an altitude of around 5,700 metres.
“The ground rescue team has reached Nims Dai (Purja) at approximately 5,700m on Broad Peak — a mountain he loved, and a mountain that has now taken him from us,” the Alpine Club of Pakistan said in a post on social media.
Three other bodies were also found, even as rescue efforts continued under extremely difficult conditions, PTI reported.
A ground rescue team was transporting the four bodies – including that of Purja – down from the mountain, AFP reported.
Purja was leading the expedition with nine other climbers – five from Nepal, one Pakistani, one Omani, one American and one Chinese. Broad Peak happens to be the world’s 12th-highest mountain, and is considered one of the most challenging peaks to climb.
On Saturday, Purja’s expedition company Elite Exped said all 10 members of the group were confirmed dead. Four of the 10 bodies had been recovered on Friday.
Nepali by birth, British by nationality and a soldier by training, Nirmal was most proud of his ancestral heritage.
“Being a Gurkha was my only dream… It was the only thing I wanted to do,” he wrote in his book.
Nicknamed ‘Nims Dai’ (Nepali for ‘older brother’), Nirmal served in the British army that continues to specially recruit Gurkhas, like the Indian and Nepali armies.
Purja had conquered the world’s 14 highest peaks within a record 189 days in 2019 – the subject of Netflix documentary ‘14 Peaks: Nothing is Impossible’.
