india

Updated: Jun 23, 2019 22:27 IST

Rescuers on Sunday recovered bodies of seven of the eight missing mountaineers around a month after an avalanche swept them away near India’s second highest mountain – Nanda Devi – in Uttarakhand’s Pithoragarh district.

Pithoragarh’s district magistrate, Vijay Kumar Jogdande, said the bodies would be brought to Nanda Devi’s base camp – Munsiyari – on foot and that it would take about two or three days.

“Once they [bodies] are brought to the base camp, they would be then airlifted by Indian Air Force helicopters from there to district headquarters where their identities would be ascertained. The operation to find the remaining one body would continue tomorrow [Monday] morning,” said Jogdande.

The four British, two American and one each Australian and Indian mountaineers were reported missing on May 31 after they failed to return to Munsiyari.

They were attempting to climb a previously unclimbed 6,477 metre peak near Nanda Devi when the avalanche hit the route they were taking. Multiple avalanches are believed to have hit Nanda Devi when the group was trying to scale the peak. An unstable, high altitude terrain had so far frustrated attempts to retrieve the bodies.

The eight were part of a group of 12 mountaineers, who left Munsiyari on May 13 to climb Nanda Devi East. They were scheduled to return to Munsiyari on May 25.

Mark Thomas, Ian Wade, Kate Armstrong and Zachary Quain, who had split from the 12-member main group, were rescued on June 2. They told officials on May 31 that they were in touch with the eight until 26 May a day before an avalanche hit the mountain.

On June 3, rescuers on board an Indian Air Force (IAF) helicopter spotted the bodies of five of the eight mountaineers. A helicopter turned back after three failed attempts to drop the rescurers on the peak on June 5.

On June 13, a 32 member-team comprising Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) and National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) personnel left on Thursday on foot to retrieve the bodies. The team was looking for the body of the eight missing climber.

“The bodies were retrieved after digging them out of snow at a height of about 17,000 ft on Sunday morning. They have been dug out by a team of 10 ITBP mountaineers, who had left for the spot four days ago before reaching there on Sunday,” said ITBP’s deputy inspector general, A P S Nimbadia.

He said the remaining body is still under the snow. “Identification of the retrieved bodies, including one female, would be done after they would be airlifted to district headquarters. Till then operation is on to find the remaining missing body.”

Nanda Devi, which is the world’s 23rd highest mountain, does not attract many climbers since it is considered one of the toughest Himalayan peaks to climb.