Nepali mountaineer Kami Rita Sherpa reached the summit of Mount Everest for the 29th time on Sunday, surpassing his own record for the most ascents of the world’s tallest peak.
Mingma Sherpa from Seven Summit Treks, the expedition organizer, confirmed, “Kami Rita reached the summit this morning, setting a new record with 29 Everest summits.”
Having served as a guide for over two decades, Sherpa, nicknamed the “Everest Man,” first conquered the 8,849-meter (29,032-foot) summit in 1994 as part of a commercial expedition. Since then, he has ascended Everest almost annually, guiding clients. It’s unclear if he had clients with him on this latest summit.
Sharing his anticipation before the climb, Sherpa posted on Instagram from base camp last week, “Back again for the 29th summit to the top of the world… One man’s job, another man/woman’s dream.”
In the previous year, Sherpa climbed Everest twice to reclaim his record, as another guide, Pasang Dawa Sherpa, matched his number of ascents.
Despite his achievements, the 54-year-old Sherpa has maintained that he was simply “just working” and had no intention of setting records. He has also successfully scaled other challenging 8,000-meter peaks, including K2 in Pakistan, the world’s second-highest mountain.
For the spring climbing season of this year, Nepal issued 414 Everest permits to mountaineers, which spans from April to early June. The majority of climbers are accompanied by Nepali guides, resulting in over 800 climbers expected to attempt the summit in the upcoming weeks, following the route opened by a group of Nepali climbers last Friday.
This year, China reopened the Tibetan route to foreigners after closing it in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Nepal, renowned for hosting eight of the world’s 10 highest peaks, attracts hundreds of adventurers each spring when favorable weather conditions prevail.
Mountaineering has become a lucrative industry since the historic first ascent by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay Sherpa in 1953. However, despite the allure, Everest also poses significant risks, as evidenced by the deadliest season on record last year, with 18 fatalities among the more than 600 climbers who reached the summit.
