Manaslu | 2014 NE Face (up), E Pinnacle (down)

A Italy expedition to Manaslu in 2014 via NE Face (up), E Pinnacle (down), led by Simone Moro. Summit reached on 14th February 2015. 2 members recorded.

Expedition Details

Field Value
ID 8808
Imported 2026-03-06 18:04:49.359634
Expedition ID MANA14401
Peak ID MANA
Year 2014
Season 4
Host Country 1
Route 1 NE Face (up), E Pinnacle (down)
Route 2 -
Route 3 -
Route 4 -
Nationality Italy
Leaders Simone Moro
Sponsor Manaslu Winter Exploration 2015
Success 1 False
Success 2 False
Success 3 False
Success 4 False
Ascent 1 -
Ascent 2 -
Ascent 3 -
Ascent 4 -
Claimed False
Disputed False
Countries -
Approach -
Basecamp Date 2015-02-11
Summit Date 2015-02-14
Summit Time -
Summit Days 3
Total Days 55
Termination Date 2015-04-07
Termination Reason 5
Termination Notes Abandoned at 5900m due to deep snow and avalanche danger
High Point (m) 5900
Traverse False
Ski False
Paraglide False
Camps 1
Fixed Rope (m) 0
Total Members 2
Summit Members 0
Member Deaths 0
Total Hired 0
Summit Hired 0
Hired Deaths 0
No Hired True
O2 Used False
O2 None True
O2 Climb False
O2 Descent False
O2 Sleep False
O2 Medical False
O2 Taken False
O2 Unknown False
Other Summits -
Campsites B(17/02,4700m),C1(23/02,5700m),xxx(24/02,5700m)
Route Notes The two-member team arrived at their Manaslu base camp (4700m) by helicopter from Kathmandu on 17 February with no climbing Sherpas and no bottled oxygen, but equiped with snowshoes for a winter climb. They planned to ascend the normal route by the NE Face to the main summit (8163m) and then descend by an unprecendented traverse over to the top of the East Pinnacle (7992m) and down to BC. However, they soon found their plans impossible to carry out. They were well acclimatized from recent climbing in Europe, but they had to struggle to break trail. It was necessary to wear snowshoes as they attempted to open their trail through six meters of deep snow on 18 to 22 February. Finally on the 23rd they managed to establish C1 at 5700m. On the 24th they went as high as 5900m to make a reconnaissance of their route above C1. But even more snowfall was predicted, so they turned around and went back to BC the same day. On the 25th they returned to C1 only to clear the camp. The predicted snow started falling on the 26th of February, and it continued falling 24 hours a day every day to 4 March. The heavy snowfall caused avalanches that fell close enough to BC that its tents were covered by powder snow clouds from the blast of the avalanching throughout the seven-day period. During this time, they prepared a helipad, stamping down the loose snow with their snowshoes. At 11:00 am on the 4th of March their helicopter hovered, but visibility was too poor to land. The two climbers retreated to the village of Samagaon, not far from BC and waited there until 5:30 pm, then spent the night in a lodge in Samagaon after taking the helicopter's battery into their tent to keep it warm enough to start then next morning. It started and the climbers flew in it to Kathmandu on 4 March. Their plans for a winter ascent of Manaslu had collapsed, but they had not given up hope of climbing the mountain. Next, they flew to Khumbu on 9 March, when they found a helicopter going to Dingboche. They kept their acclimatization by trekking to Chhukung and based themselves there. They kept fit by running up some nearby peaks, including Chhukung Ri (5550m) on 20 March. On the 25th they raced from the lodge to the summit of Island Peak (Imjatse, 6183m) and back to the lodge in ten and a half hours by the normal route of this frequently climbed mountain. Three days later they pioneered a new route by moving to up its East Summit in 11 hours, 50 minutes via the NNW Face to the West Ridge and then retraced their steps to the lodge. They left Khumbu by flying from Namche Bazar via Lukla to Kathmandu on 31 March. They now returned their attention to Manaslu and on 4 April flew to the helipad they had made in early April, hoping to scale the 8163m high Manaslu at last. But they found their tent had been destroyed by heavy snowfall, rather than finding, as they had hoped, improved conditions. They stayed in a new small tent for three days to rest and worked to restore their BC. They moved on snowshoes up to 5700m and the site of their C1, which they had pitched in late February. But on 7 April, after probing a meter and a half deep snow for an hour and finding no trace of their C1 tent, and witnessing avalanching that was more serious than it had been before, and one of Moro's snowshoes having broken, they abandoned Manaslu and chartered a helicopter back to Kathmandu.
Accidents -
Achievement -
Agency Cho Oyu Trekking
Commercial Route False
Standard Route False
Primary Route False
Primary Member False
Primary Reference False
Primary ID -
Checksum 2460252
Year 2014
Summit Success False
O2 Summary None
Route (lowercase) ne face (up), e pinnacle (down)

Members

2 recorded members.

Name Sex Year of Birth Citizenship Status Residence Occupation
Tamara Lunger F 1986 Italy Climber Gunner, Bozen, Italy Alpinist Details Other expeditions
Simone Moro M 1967 Italy Leader Ponteranica, Bergamo, Italy Alpinist Details Other expeditions

References

0 recorded references.