Mana. A team of 14 Indian climbers from the Army Adventure ...

M ana. A team o f 14 Indian clim bers from the Army A dventure Foundation and 13 A m erican A rm y clim bers were the first joint team from the Indian and U.S. A rm ies. They put 26 clim bers on the sum m it (7272 m eters, 23,860 feet) by the southw est ridge, first clim bed by Frank Sm ythe in 1937. H ow ever Sm ythe had m ade an easier approach from the south, w hile the arm y m en made a new one from the w est. The Indians were jo int-leader M ajor H .S. C hauhan, T hakur D as, A .B. G oth, N.B. G urung, R.P. G urung, R avindar N ath, Lalit K um ar N egi, R attan Singh R ana, N.S. Roy, B aldev Singh, Devi Singh, Dhan Singh, R am phal Singh and R .S. Tokas. The A m ericans were joint-leader Robert W ood, T im othy B row n, Buren D avis, C harles Roth, Tony H ale, Richard H eath, Jeffrey H olt, E ugene Iw anyk, Joseph M attison, M ichael N orth, Shane Shisler, D avid Strobel and W illiam Pelkey. They began to trek from the roadhead at M ana village on A ugust 27. B ase C am p at 4575 m eters was set up on A ugust 20. T hey ascended the U ttar N agthuni G lacier, w hich had a difficult icefall. B eyond Cam p I, they follow ed the sharp and icy southw est ridge and set up Cam ps II and III at 6035 and 6705 m eters. Five Indians gained the sum m it on Septem ber 13: R .R G urung, Rattan Singh R ana, Devi Singh, D han Singh and Ram phal Singh. Finally, 26 clim bers in all reached the sum m it, but the w eather turned vicious after the 15th and they were all back in Base C am p on Septem ber 18. K a m a l K . G u h a , Editor, H im avanta, India