KARAKORAM RANGE, PAKISTAN: A mountaineer from Norway is facing severe criticism for allegedly leaving behind a dying porter and not trying enough to save him. Instead, it is believed that members of her team walked over him in pursuit of the record-breaking ascent of K2 in Pakistan, in July.
However, Kristin Harila, 37, denied such allegations and claimed that her team did everything they could to save the man. Mohammed Hassan plummeted from a narrow ridge, but the conditions didn’t allow the team to move him.
Who is Kristin Harila?
The Norwegian mountaineer, Kristin Harila is facing serious allegations of leaving her guide to die in pursuit of glory. The professional said, “It is simply not true to say that we did nothing to help him.,” Harila told the Telegraph.
“We tried to lift him back up for an hour and a half and my cameraman stayed on for another hour to look after him. At no point was he left alone.”
Who is Mohammed Hassan?
The video from the drone went viral that shows mountaineers clambering over Hassan on the snowbound peak. Among her critics, were Australian climbers Wilhelm Steindl and Philip Flämig, who were there on K2 at that time and captured the video. The two accused Harila and her team members of abandoning Hassan to make a new world record.
“He is being treated by one person while everyone else is pushing towards the summit. The fact is that there was no organized rescue operation although there were Sherpas and mountain guides on site who could have taken action,” Flämig told Austria’s Standard newspaper.
The climber reasoned that Hassan ‘was treated like a second-class human being. “If he had been a Westerner, he would have been rescued immediately. No one felt responsible for him. What happened there is a disgrace. A living human was left lying so that records could be set.”
“I also feel angry at how many people have been blaming others for this tragic accident,” Harila wrote. “This was no one’s fault, you cannot comment when you do not understand the situation, and sending death threats is never okay.”
Harila emphasized that along with her, the Sherpa and her cameraman, Gabriel, tried everything to rescue Hassan from what she said was ‘the most dangerous part of the deadliest mountain in the world.’
“As we were trying to move Hassan up closer to the path, an avalanche went off around the corner where the fixing team was,” said Harila before adding “We got the message that they had problems. At this stage, we decided to split up. Gabriel stayed with Hassan and his friend in the bottleneck.”
Harila, and her Nepali Sherpa Tenjen (Lama) Sherpa, became the world’s fastest climbers to reach all peaks above 26,000 feet.
