The body of a famed U.S. ski mountaineer was discovered in Nepal Wednesday, two days after she fell off the world’s eighth-highest mountain near its peak.
Hilaree Nelson, 49, had been skiing down from the summit of Mount Manaslu with her partner Jim Morrison, also a celebrated extreme skiier, when she fell off the Himalayan mountain on Monday.
Bad weather had hampered rescue efforts, but teams were able to renew their search on Tuesday. Nelson’s body was eventually found and retrieved on Wednesday, a spokesperson for Shangri-La Nepal Trek, the company that organized the expedition, told NBC News.
The spokesperson said Nelson’s body would be transported to Kathmandu.
Tour company Elite Exped and mountaineer Nims Purja, its co-founder, said in an Instagram post that the company’s team had successfully recovered Nelson’s body. They said she would “be on her way home soon.”
Morrison did not immediately respond to a request for comment from NBC News. Neither did The North Face, the outdoor clothing and equipment company that sponsored Nelson.
In a statement on Monday, The North Face confirmed that Nelson had gone missing below the summit of Mt. Manaslu. The company said it was in touch with her family and “supporting search and rescue efforts in every way we can.”
Nelson, from Telluride, Colorado, and Morrison, from Tahoe, California, are extreme skiers who summited Mount Lhotse, the world’s fourth-highest, in 2018.
On its website, The North Face has previously described Nelson as “the most prolific ski mountaineer of her generation,” noting that she was the “first female to link two 8000m peaks, Everest and Lhotse, in one 24 hour push.” The company said Nelson was also a mother of two.
In her last Instagram post, published last week, Nelson described her difficulties in her latest climb, saying she hadn’t “felt as sure-footed on Manaslu as I have on past adventure into the thin atmosphere of the high Himalaya.”
“These past weeks have tested my resilience in new ways,” she wrote. “The constant monsoon with its incessant rain and humidity has made me hopelessly homesick. I am challenged to find the peace and inspiration from the mountain when it’s been constantly shrouded in mist.”
Still, she also described happier experiences, describing skiing down to base camp with Morrison in a journey “full of shenanigans rappelling over seracs with our skis on, posing for pictures with climbers going uphill.”
“We got back to BC soaking wet, in the pouring rain, just in time for a hearty BC dinner. Smiling and laughing felt amazing!” she had written.
On Monday, an avalanche at a lower elevation on Mount Manaslu swept away several climbers, killing a Nepali guide and injuring others.
All of the climbers caught in the avalanche were accounted for, with some of the injured flown to Kathmandu and treated in hospitals.
Nepal’s government has issued permits to over 500 climbers looking to attempt to scale high mountain peaks during the autumn season, with most of them setting their sights on Mount Manaslu.
Associated Press contributed.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
