Mustagh Ata Ascent and Mustagh Ata North Attempt. The NOK ...

M ustagh A ta A scent a n d M ustagh A ta N orth A ttem pt. The N OK M ustagh A ta International F riendship Expedition successfully clim bed M ustagh Ata (7546 m eters, 24,757 feet). On A ugust 8, British A nthony and V ictoria W illoughby and Frenchm an D idier G aillard reached the sum m it. On A ugust 11, British D ick R enshaw , Japanese K eiichi O zaki and Hiro Sasao and A m ericans M arti M artin K untz and I got to the top. Previously we had made an unsuccessful attem pt on M ustagh A ta N orth (7427 m eters, 24,367 feet). This is in fact not a sub-peak but a com pletely separate m ountain cut o ff from M ustagh A ta by the Y am bulak G lacier w hich gouges a 3000-foot cliff-lined chasm betw een the tw o from sum m it to base. Its w indy north ridge was clim bed by four Japanese in 1981, the only ascent o f the peak. (On A ugust 7, 1981, leader T adakio Sakahara and Koji M atsui reached the sum m it, follow ed on A ugust 14 by T akao H ayashida and Junichi T akahashi.) O ur plan was to see how high we could reach on the sam e ridge on skis in preparation for our quick, nonstop ski ascent and descent o f M ustagh Ata. W e approached the ridge from the southw est flank as opposed to the Japanese, w ho had reached it via a northeast spur. The ridge itself essentially begins at 20,000 feet. W e set up Base Cam p at 15,700 feet on the south side o f the C hodom ak G lacier. The glacier led into a giant am phitheater flanked by the north and northw est ridges. W e clim bed a headw all and, after a third carry, cam ped at 18,570 feet on a protected shoulder ju st below the main north ridge. R enshaw and I both were struck by the first sym ptom s o f altitude sickness and descended the next m orning, along w ith G aillard, who was snow -blind. The others continued their ascent o f N orth M ustagh, reaching 20,500 feet on the north ridge before storm conditions and persistent high w inds drove them back dow n. M ic ha el J ardine