Jerzy Kukuczka

Eight-thousanders[edit]
Kukuczka is widely considered among the climbing community to be one of the best high-altitude climbers in history. He ascended all fourteen mountains in just under eight years, a shorter time than any climber before (Reinhold Messner included, whom it took 16 years) or since. In the process, Kukuczka established ten new routes and climbed four summits in winter. He was one of an elite group of Polish Himalayan mountaineers who specialized in winter ascents. He established 9 new routes on the eight-thousanders, 4 of which were winter routes (compared to 6 new routes of Messner's, none of them during winter).

Year Location

Mountain

Route

Comments

1979 Nepal

Lhotse

West Face

Normal Route

1980 Nepal

Mount Everest

South Pillar

New Route

1981 Nepal

Makalu

Variation to Makalu La/North-West Ridge

New Route, Alpine Style, Solo.

1982 Pakistan Broad Peak

West Spur

Normal Route, Alpine Style.

1983 Pakistan Gasherbrum II

South-East Spur

New Route, Alpine Style.

1983 Pakistan Gasherbrum I

South-West Face

New Route, Alpine Style.

1984 Pakistan Broad Peak

Traverse of North, Middle and Main Summits

New Route, Alpine Style.

1985 Nepal

Dhaulagiri

North-East Spur

Normal Route, First Winter Ascent.[1]

1985 Nepal

Cho Oyu

South-East Pillar

New Route, First Winter Ascent, Second Summit Team.

1985 Pakistan Nanga Parbat

South-East Pillar

New Route.

1986 Nepal

Kanchenjunga

South-West Face

Normal Route, First Winter Ascent.

1986 Pakistan K2

South Face

New Route.

1986 Nepal

Manaslu

North-East Face

New Route, Alpine Style.

1987 Nepal

Annapurna I

North Face

Normal Route, First Winter Ascent.

1987 China

Shisha Pangma

West Ridge

New Route, Alpine Style, Ski

Descent.

1988 Nepal

Annapurna East Summit

South Face

New Route, Alpine Style.

He climbed all summits except for Mount Everest without use of supplemental oxygen. Kukuczka died attempting to climb the unclimbed South Face of Lhotse in Nepal on 24 October 1989. Leading a pitch at an altitude of about 8,200 meters on a 6 mm secondhand rope he had picked up in a market in Kathmandu (according to Ryszard Pawowski, Kukuczka's climbing partner on the tragic day, the main single rope used by the team was too jammed to be used and the climbers decided to use transport rope instead), the cord either was cut or snapped from a fall, plunging Kukuczka to his death.