Yesterday the news broke of yet another avalanche in the Himalaya, this time on Annapurna. The details have been sketchy, but we know that a trio of Uzbek climbers were ascending from Camp 1 to Camp 2 when the accident occurred. Two of those climbers were caught up in the slide, while one managed to escape and eventually make his way back to C1 to call for help.
At the time that I posted that breaking story yesterday a search and rescue team was en route to the site of the avalanche to search for survivors. While we still don’t have much in the way of new information today, Russian Climb is reporting that eight Russian and Uzbek mountaineers spent the day searching the area and didn’t find any signs of the two missing climbers. They even used a helicopter to support their efforts, but to no avail.
Search efforts will continue today but it seems unlikely at this point that either Iljas Tukhvatullin or Ivan Lobanov will be found alive. There is no indication if either of them were wearing avalanche beacons at the time of the accident. Such beacons should be mandatory equipment on mountains like Manaslu and Annapurna, but many climbers still go up without them.
Russin Climb promises more updates as they come in. For now we’ll just have to wait for news.
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