Posted on 08/23/2025 12:21:50 PM PDT by DFG
A bid to save a woman stuck 22,000ft up a mountain with a broken leg has been called off after ten days due to bad weather - and one rescuer died trying to help her.
Russian mountaineer Natalia, also known as Natasha, Nagovitsina, 47, has been trapped at 22,965ft on Victory Peak in Kyrgyzstan, with a summit height of 24,406ft.
Nagovitsina, who is a well-known mountaineer, was reportedly seen moving on drone footage as recently as three days ago.
She was injured on August 12, when her climbing partner helped her as best they could before returning further down the mountain to get help.
But since then temperatures have sunk to minus 23C and multiple rescue attempts have ended in tragedy.
Italian climber Luca Sinigaglia, 49, was one of those who attempted to rescue her and managed to deliver a sleeping bag, tent, food, water and a gas cooker to Nagovitsina.
But repeated efforts to bring her down failed, both by climbing and using a helicopter.
Matters escalated after Sinigaglia himself then died on the mountain from prolonged exposure to low oxygen and hypothermia.
Today a final effort to climb to Nagovitsina was abandoned just 3,600ft below where she is stuck, with the weather set to worsen, as the team were ordered to return to base camp.
Previously attempts involved two separate helicopters, including a defence ministry Mi-8 helicopter which crashed as it sought to rescue her.
Another helicopter, a Mi-17VM, was sent, but zero visibility again forced rescuers to abandon the attempt.
Dmitry Grekov, rescue leader and head of base camp at Victory Peak, said today that experienced mountaineer Vitaly Akimov had led a team seeking to climb to Nagovitsina.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
Kyrgyzstan is on China’s NW border.
I believe there are still bodies on Mount Everest that are deemed unrecoverable.
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Hundreds and that’s just the ones they have found. Others have never been found
The peak was originally named Peak of the 20th Anniversary of Komsomol (Young Communist League), but was renamed after WWII.
Shes a mountaineer. She knows the risks. If shes a true mountaineer she will be ok with dying on the mountain doing what she enjoyed. Better than being hit by a car or choking on a piece of fish, or slipping in the bathroom and cracking her head open.
She’s dead Jim.
MANY MANY bodies on Everest. You walk by many places where they are.
Probably can compensate with natural blood thinner supplements.
No, the air is too thin
Sad…RIP
I live outside Denver. Years ago, I think when IN THIN AIR, came out there was an EVEREDT IMAX at the museum. They also had lectures on various related. One thing I took away is altitude sickness is finicky. It can hit a super in shape iron man type while not affecting the normal in shape guy standing next to him.
These adrenaline rush freaks need to just suffer the consequences for their foolishness. No one should be asked to save idiots like this.
About 20 years ago we went to colorado. The day after we arrived we drove up Pikes Peak. (14,115 ft)
Since we weren’t acclimated it was pretty rough. I remember saying “Nice view, let’s go.”
Two weeks ago we went again to visit our kid who just moved there. On day four, (somewhat acclimated) we drove up Pikes Peak again. Just that little bit of acclimation allowed us to stay at the top for three hours. But we were starting to get a little bit loopy toward the end.
20 years ago the road was only paved part way. It’s all paved now. Not nearly as much fun
Wrong
I had the same experience in the Alps. Could barely breathe, and had to rest every few minutes.
My understanding is that there are some that are semi-buried in the snow and visible, still wearing their gear, but they can’t bring them down, and they can’ re-bury them somewhere, so...they just poke out of the snow for all to see.
Doctor said that you’re going to die.....
And they should make the entire airplane out of the same material they use to make the "Black Box" flight recorder.
Regards,
I went to rocky mountain national park, got off the bus, walked about 50’ to the bathroom and thought I was going to die.
I lived my entire life at sea level
Yes, opinions do vary with this. I suppose part of my opinion comes from my core belief that our body is just a thing we occupy in this life, and when it dies we are no longer in it. It is just a thing to be discarded.
And if a guy is in a kill zone and bleeding out, and sending someone else out to retrieve him is basically just guaranteeing a higher body count, then it is simply throwing that second life away. Not a good look, to say the least.
But I guess the Japanese did that quite a bit towards the end of the Pacific war in 1945.
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