GIlGIT: A 64-year-old Japanese climber Onishi Hiroshi has died after falling into a crevasse on the Golden Peak glacier in the Gilgit-Baltistan district Nagir region, local officials said. Deputy Commissioner Nager Attaur Rehman Kakar has confirmed the death of Onishi Hiroshi.
He was part of a four-member Japanese team that had hired two porters to climb the 7,027-meter peak. The team had reached the summit on July 1 and was descending when the incident took place on July 2. The climber’s body was recovered and brought to Camp today.
Earlier, on June 14, a government official said that one of the two Japanese climbers was found dead and his body was recovered from a mountain in northern Pakistan. Atsushi Taguchi and Ryuseki Hiraoka were trying to reach the summit of the 7,027-metre-high Spantik mountain in the Karakoram range before they went missing.
Wali Ullah Falahi, the deputy commissioner of Shigar district told media that the dead body of the Japanese climber was found. He said that the body had been identified as Ryuseki Hiraoka.
The search by high-altitude climbers and experts was supported by two Pakistan Army helicopters. The two climbers reached the base camp on June 3 and were attempting the climb without the help of porters.
Pakistan is home to five of the world’s 14 mountains higher than 8,000 metres, including K2, the world’s second highest. According to government figures, more than 8,900 foreigners came to the remote Gilgit-Baltistan region in 2013, where most of the Karakoram range is located.
