Kangchenjunga | 2009 SW Face

A S Korea expedition to Kangchenjunga in 2009 via SW Face, led by Oh Eun-Sun. Summit reached on 6th May 2009. 8 members recorded.

Expedition Details

Field Value
ID 6458
Imported 2026-03-06 18:04:49.359634
Expedition ID KANG09108
Peak ID KANG
Year 2009
Season 1
Host Country 1
Route 1 SW Face
Route 2 -
Route 3 -
Route 4 -
Nationality S Korea
Leaders Oh Eun-Sun
Sponsor Oh Eun-Sun Kangchenjunga & Dhaulagiri I Expedition
Success 1 False
Success 2 False
Success 3 False
Success 4 False
Ascent 1 -
Ascent 2 -
Ascent 3 -
Ascent 4 -
Claimed True
Disputed False
Countries -
Approach Biratnagar->Taplejung->Yamphudin->Cheram->Ramze->Glacier Camp
Basecamp Date 2009-04-08
Summit Date 2009-05-06
Summit Time 1745
Summit Days 28
Total Days 32
Termination Date 2009-05-10
Termination Reason 1
Termination Notes -
High Point (m) 8400
Traverse False
Ski False
Paraglide False
Camps 4
Fixed Rope (m) 2500
Total Members 5
Summit Members 0
Member Deaths 0
Total Hired 5
Summit Hired 0
Hired Deaths 0
No Hired False
O2 Used True
O2 None False
O2 Climb True
O2 Descent False
O2 Sleep False
O2 Medical False
O2 Taken False
O2 Unknown False
Other Summits Climbed Dhaulagiri (DHA1-091-13)
Campsites BC(08/04,5600m),C1(19/04,6150m),C2(20/04,6615m),C3(27/04,7100m),C4(05/05,7700m),xxx(06/05)
Route Notes Oh's summit push started on 3 May from BC to C2. On 4 May to C3, on 5 May to C4. Miss Oh, Dawa, Pema and Nurbu started from C4 at 9 pm, reached summit at 5:45 pm on 6 May, stayed on summit for about 10 minutes, descended to C4 where they arrived at 11:30 am on 7 May, slept for 3 hours then descended to BC where they arrived at 5:30 pm. Weather on summit push was good at the beginning. After 2 pm started little snowfall. After 5 pm the weather became bad, sometimes it was total white-out. But there was bright moon, on summit little little windy. Spanish team of Pasaban was at C3. The team returned to Kathmandu on 11 May. Oh is planning to go to Dhaulagiri on 24 May. Other member's high points: Hong, Kim and Park only BC. Jung went up to C3 on 27 April. Sherpa summiters: Dawa Wangchuk/Ongchu, 17/12/72 (3/9/2029), Mathilow, Walung, Makalu-9, Kangch X3, Everest X3, etc Pema Tshering, 16/6/70 (2/3/2027), Walung, Makalu-9, Everest X3, Dhaulagiri I X1, Lhotse X1 Nurbu Sherpa, 10/12/84 (25/8/2041), Nurbugaon, Makalu-5, Everest X1, Lhotse X1 Miss Oh Eun-Sun's Kangchenjunga Summit Claim - Elizabeth Hawley, 5 June 2010 Whether Miss Oh Eun-Sun did or did not climb all the way to the summit of Kangchenjunga in May 2009 is a matter under dispute. Miss Oh said on 3 May 2010 that she relied completely on Dawa Wangchuk Sherpa, who was her guide and had summited Kangchenjunga three times before. He told her that they had arrived at the summit, and therefore she is sure they were on or very, very close to the top. The video of her climb shows her at this highest point standing on an uneven rocky surface with some snow in the cracks. She did also say that she actually stopped 10 linear meters or five vertical meters from the top. On 10 May, in reiterating her summit claim, she became tearful; she is deeply convinced of the truth of her claim. She convinced Reinhold Messner, who was in Kathmandu at the same time as she. He said on 9 May, after a long interview with her, that she probably did get to within a few meters of the top and not the very top because the wind was too strong to go to the top. He recalled that when the British-New Zealand expedition made the first ascent in May 1955, they stopped short of the summit, and their claim is recognized. [They stopped short out of respect for the sentiments of the Lepcha people who live on its eastern side and consider the summit the home of their gods.] Dawa Wangchuk said on 23 May that all four in the summit party, Miss Oh, he himself and their two Sherpas, stood on the top together. They climbed to the summit in single file: he himself was in the lead, then Miss Oh, Pemba Tshering and lastly Nurbu. (In order to move faster, Nurbu had taken off his oxygen to reduce the weight he was carrying about 250 vertical meters below the top.) If Miss Oh says they stopped a few meters below the top, maybe she was confused by lack of oxygen. Dawa Wangchuk and Nurbu helped her down from the summit to about 8300m because she was dehydrated. However Nurbu has a different account. He began on 25 May by saying, "I want to tell the truth." He reported that Miss Oh, Dawa Wangchuk, who was the guide, and Pemba Tshering stopped 150 vertical meters below the top. He himself was 10 vertical meters above them in strong wind and light snowfall. He was then signalled by the others to come back to where they were. Why? Don't know. He obeyed orders, descended from the team's highest point, and they all went down together. He had a camera with him but didn't use it; the inference was that he saw no use in taking a picture below the top. A question has been raised in the media as to whether Nurbu has refuted Miss Oh's summit claim because his fingers and toes were frostbitten during his climb, and therefore he holds a grudge against her. Nurbu said on 5 June that he had stopped using oxygen before climbing to his high point and got frostbite in his descent without it. While descending at about 10:30 pm he had become very tired and sat down to rest; he fell asleep, and it was only when Miss Oh and Pemba Tshering came to him in their own descent, roused him and got him to go down with them, that he realized something was wrong with his fingers and toes. He was not seriously affected, but his fingers and toes are still sensitive. Miss Oh gave him funds in Kathmandu to start his medical treatment and sent more to him from Korea. He does not blame Miss Oh for his condition; he says it was his mistake to go to sleep. Edurne Pasaban's expedition was on Kangchenjunga in May 2009 and summited 12 days after Miss Oh claimed ascent. She said on 22 April that she was sure for three reasons that Miss Oh did not get to the top: (1) her team watched the Koreans as they climbed above their last camp, saw them battling very strong wind before disappearing in cloud, then reappear in descent in so short a time that it was "impossible" for them to have gotten to the top; (2) two of the Sherpas with Miss Oh told Miss Pasaban that they had not summited; (3) in the "summit" photo showing Miss Oh standing on rock, she is definitely not on the summit, where Miss Pasaban found herself standing in snow (there was not enough snowfall between their summit dates, 6 and 18 May, to have made the difference, Miss Pasaban said). Miss Pasaban went to Tibet on 24 April; on her return to Kathmandu, on 23 May she was shown stills from Miss Oh's video at several spots above C4 and her stance on the "top." "I think she didn't go to the summit," Miss Pasaban reiterated because of the lack of snow under her feet. Another Korean woman summited Kangchenjunga on 18 May 2009. She was Miss Go Mi-Sun, who was also striving to scale all 8000ers. That month her team's leader, Kim Jae-Soo, showed a photo of Miss Go sitting on snow with a summit in the very near background; the summit is about three-fourths under snow while smooth rock shows at its edges. Park Young-Seok, who was not on Kangchenjunga in May 2009 but had summited it ten years previously also via the SW Face, said on 18 May it is "impossible" for her to have reached close to the summit based on her own data. He calculated her rate of ascent during her climb from their last camp (he put it at 7800m) to 8060m at 35 meters per hour, from 8060m to 8320m at 30.5 m/hr, then from 8320m to summit at 76.4 m/hr. He noted that the climb up from 8320m is the most difficult section, and climbing without oxygen (as Miss Oh was) makes it more difficult still. He said the Korean Alpine Federation held a meeting in Seoul in the autumn of 2009 to discuss her claim after a question was raised by another Korean climber. Miss Oh was present, and one of her sponsors invited Dawa Wangchuk Sherpa to come to Korea in support of her claim. No decision was taken at the meeting. Park doesn't know why. From Elizabeth Hawley's Seasonal Stories, Spring 2010 - 11 Sept 2010 Exactly who was the first woman to summit all 8000-meter mountains? A controversy erupted this spring over whether it was a South Korean or a Spanish Basque. Was it Miss Oh Eun-Sun, who scaled Annapurna I this spring after having claimed the summit of Kangchenjunga in May 2009, or was it Miss Edurne Pasaban who reached the summits of Annapurna I and Xixabangma this spring? Miss Oh is sincerely convinced that she summited Kangchenjunga on 6 May 2009, and she produces a picture of herself standing on a rocky formation that shows more rock somewhat above her. She says she and her three Sherpas were perhaps ten linear meters or five vertical meters from the top, and she relies completely on the expertise of her head Sherpa, Dawa Wangchuk, who had summited the mountain three times before and led her to this point. If he says, as he does, that they were on top, then she has no doubt that that's where they were. But there were debates in Korea last year about her Kangchenjunga summit claim at two meetings in Seoul last November and December. It was here in Korea that the controversy first arose -- before the issue burst into a matter of worldwide interest this spring, when both she and Edurne Pasaban said they had now "conquered" all eight-thousanders. The first discussion was organized by three Korean mountaineering journals, which took no decision, and the second by the Corean Alpine Club, and after some discussion, the meeting also came to no conclusion. However this August, after Miss Oh's success on her "last" eight-thousander, the CAC's chairman stated that "there is no evidence that she did not reach the summit. Accordingly, the Corean Alpine Club acknowledges she had successfully reached the summit." But this decision is by no means universally supported. Her rival for the record, Miss Edurne Pasaban, also led an expedition to Kangchenjunga in the same season, and she is certain that not enough time elapsed between the time she saw Miss Oh's summit party battling strong wind to reach about 8450m (perhaps 136m below the top) and then move out of sight behind a buttress, and the time at which they reappeared. Others who were also on the mountain at the same time agree with Miss Pasaban, and a well-known Korean, who does not want to be named, told me that her claimed rate of climbing that final day up the most difficult section of the route was "impossible." The leader of another Korean team on Kangchenjunga at the same time as Miss Oh, Kim Jae-Soo, as early as June 2009, when his team had just returned to Kathmandu from a successful climb of Dhaulagiri I, produced two contrasting photos: a picture of his star member, Miss Go Mi-Sun, sitting in good snow, and Miss Oh's best evidence of her Kangchenjunga success, standing on rock with a little snow scattered on it; the background is blurred, but some rock appears to be behind and above her. Even one of Miss Oh's "summit" Sherpas, Nurbu, has disputed her claim. He told me in June this year that the summit party stopped about 150m below the top while, he himself climbed ten meters above them but was then called back to where they were, and they all descended from there. Why? He doesn't know. He said he had taken no photograph of his high point. But Nurbu's testimony cannot be fully relied on: Miss Pasaban made a special trip to Kathmandu to receive some photos which she understood he would make available to her, but when she met him, she says he asked one million euros for his pictures. She paid him nothing and went home empty-handed. But Nurbu told Miss Oh's trekking agent that he had said to Miss Pasaban that even if she gave him a million euros he would not support her. What would appear to be the most serious blow to Miss Oh, on 26 August this year the Korean Alpine Federation, the nation's largest climbing association, concluded that Miss Oh had not reached the top of Kangchenjunga. Following KAF's meeting in Seoul of six leading Koreans who had scaled the mountain (including Kim Jae-Soo), KAF's secretary general told the Korean press that "all of the participants shared the view that the landscape shown in Miss Oh's alleged photo shots throughout the entire ascent doesn't seem to match the actual landscape. They also agreed that Oh's previous explanations on the process of her ascent are unreliable." One principal cause of their doubts was the timetable she presented about her progress in ascent on the final day. They judged her claimed rate of ascent to have been very unlikely given the bad weather and the greater difficulty of the route as she and her Sherpas moved ever higher, plus her the fact that she was using no supplemental oxygen. Miss Oh's reported response: "It's a unilateral opinion." Miss Pasaban is quoted as saying, "This confirmation eases my mind." The latest dispute raised by Korean journalists arose in late August, when it became general knowledge that Miss Oh carried in her pocket on summit day the flag or banner of her university. It was seen carefully placed on the route by a Norwegian summiter and also by Kim Jae-Soo, who picked it up and brought it down with him. Kim said he saw it during his own descent from the top on the same day as Miss Oh's claimed success; he judges it might have been about 150m below the top. Could this mean that Nurbu Sherpa was correct about Miss Oh's having stopped at that altitude? If so, why did her head Sherpa, Dawa Wangchuk, who had summited the mountain three times before, tell her they were at the top? Was it because she had been climbing without oxygen and was clearly extremely tired, as she herself later said, and he feared she might totally collapse if she forced herself to push on higher? So the questions remains, who was the first woman to summit all eight-thousanders? Doubt about Miss Oh's sincerely-believed Kangchenjunga summit claim may never be dispelled. Declaration of Korean Alpine Federation on Miss Oh's Kangchenjunga 2009 Korean Alpine Federation (president In-Jeong Lee) had a meeting with 6 Korean summiteers of Mt. Kangchenjunga, Mr. Hong-Gil Um (summit in 2000), Young-Seok Park (summit in 1999), Wang-Yong Han (summit in 2002), Jae-Soo Kim (summit in 2009), Chang-Ho Kim (summit in 2010O), Woong-Sik Kim (summit in 2002) and Jea-Bong Kim, managing director of KAF at the conference room of KAF on Aug 26. After in-depth discussion with 6 summiters and one more summiteer, Sung-Ho Suh (summit in 2010) as on phone, KAF declared her summit claim 'unlikely' and the facts to prove her summiting were not enough. But KAF adds that it is still opened for her if she submits more proof or evidence on her summit. In-Jeong Lee President of Korean Alpine Federation
Accidents Frostbite of Norbu's fingers
Achievement 1st Korean woman on Kangchenjunga summit
Agency Korean Treks & Expeditions
Commercial Route False
Standard Route True
Primary Route False
Primary Member False
Primary Reference False
Primary ID -
Checksum 2457462
Year 2009
Summit Success False
O2 Summary Used
Route (lowercase) sw face

Members

8 recorded members.

Name Sex Year of Birth Citizenship Status Residence Occupation
Sung-Jun Hong M 1970 S Korea Film Team Seoul, S Korea Cameraman Details Other expeditions
Ha-Young Jung M 1966 S Korea Film Team Seoul, S Korea Cameraman Details Other expeditions
Tae-Min Kim M 1958 S Korea Film Team Seoul, S Korea Documentary film producer for Korean Broadcasting System Details Other expeditions
Eun-Sun Oh F 1966 S Korea Leader Seoul, S Korea Alpinist Details Other expeditions
Jin Park M 1966 S Korea Climber Seoul, S Korea Outdoor activities equipment business owner Details Other expeditions
Dawa Wangchuk (Dawa Ongchu) Sherpa M 1972 Nepal H-A Worker Walung, Makalu-9, Makalu-Barun - Details Other expeditions
Pema Tshering Sherpa M 1970 Nepal H-A Worker Walung, Makalu-9, Makalu-Barun - Details Other expeditions
Nurbu Sherpa M 1984 Nepal H-A Worker Nurbugaon, Makalu-Barun - Details Other expeditions

References

2 recorded references.

Expedition ID Journal Author Title Publisher Citation Yak 94
KANG09108 KAN - Female Climbers - 1:8-9 (Sep 2009) -
KANG09108 - - http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2010/09/01/2010090100530.html - - -