The body of renowned US ski mountaineer Hilaree Nelson was found close to Mount Manaslu’s peak in the Himalayas by a search party in Nepal.
On Monday, Nelson, 49, went missing while descending the eighth-highest mountain in the world with her companion.
On Wednesday, rescuers discovered her body on the 8,163m (26,781ft) peak’s south face. According to earlier reports, she had slipped into a glacier crevasse.
One of the best mountaineers of her generation was Nelson.
She and her partner Jim Morrison made history in 2018 when they were the first to ski down Mount Lhotse in Nepal, the fourth-highest peak in the world.
She is also the first woman to ascend the nearby Lhotse and the tallest mountain in the world, Everest, in the span of a single 24-hour period.
On Wednesday morning, according to the organisers of the expedition, Morrison and three Sherpa guides were lowered by helicopter to rescue Nelson’s body from a height of roughly 6,000 metres on Manaslu.
“The deceased has been transported to base camp. It would be flown to Kathmandu after completing the relevant legal processes “Jiban Ghimire, managing director of Shangri-La Nepal Trek, was quoted as saying by the Kathmandu Post.
Due to poor weather, earlier helicopter searches had been futile.
Nelson went missing on the same day that an avalanche lower on the same summit claimed one life and injured over a dozen others.
Only 15 minutes after reaching Manaslu’s top, she reportedly fell into a large crevasse in the ice, according to witnesses.
Other climbers who were with the couple said that “her ski blade skidded off and [she] plunged over the other side of the peak,” a local guide who had been working with them told Outside magazine.
