The Three Pinnacles are a formation of steep rocks along the northeast ridge on

Mount Everest Mount Everest (), known locally as Sagarmatha in Nepal and Qomolangma in Tibet, is Earth's highest mountain above sea level. It lies in the Mahalangur Himal sub-range of the Himalayas and marks part of the China–Nepal border at it ...

. They were one of the longest unsolved challenges in high-level

mountaineering Mountaineering, mountain climbing, or alpinism is a set of outdoor activities that involves ascending mountains. Mountaineering-related activities include traditional outdoor climbing, skiing, and traversing via ferratas that have become mounta ...

, but have now been successfully climbed. The rocks are located at around 7,800, 8,100 and 8,200 metres

above sea level Height above mean sea level is a measure of a location's vertical distance (height, elevation or altitude) in reference to a vertical datum based on a historic mean sea level. In geodesy, it is formalized as orthometric height. The zero level ...

(height of base of pinnacle) and are therefore already in the

death zone In mountaineering, the death zone refers to altitudes above which the pressure of oxygen is insufficient to sustain human life for an extended time span. This point is generally considered to be , where atmospheric pressure is less than . The co ...

, in which people cannot usually recover, even at rest. The

normal route A normal route or normal way (; ) is the most frequently used climbing route for ascending and descending a given mountain peak; it is usually the easiest and often the most straightforward route. Other generic names include the ''Tourism, tourist ...

s on Everest avoid this area; the normal northern route leaves it to the left. During the various attempts to conquer the pinnacles and open a new route along the entire northeast ridge, there were frequently serious problems and fatalities. In 1982

Peter Boardman Peter Boardman (25 December 1950 – 17 May 1982) was an English mountaineer and author. He is best known for a series of bold and lightweight expeditions to the Himalayas, often in partnership with Joe Tasker, and for his contribution to mount ...

and

Joe Tasker Joe Tasker (12 May 1948 – 17 May 1982) was a British Climbing, climber, active during the late 1970s and early 1980s. He died while climbing Mount Everest. Early life Born into a Roman Catholic family in 1948, Tasker was the second of ten ...

died during their first serious attempt to climb grade 5 climbs in the death zone. In 1988, Russell Brice and Harry Taylor successfully climbed the Three Pinnacles, but they were so exhausted after climbing the third pinnacle that they abandoned their original plan to continue along the normal route to the summit. Instead, they crossed the normal route along the north ridge and descended to the

North Col __NOTOC__ The North Col (; ) refers to the sharp-edged pass carved by glaciers in the ridge connecting Mount Everest and Changtse in Tibet. It forms the head of the East Rongbuk Glacier. When climbers attempt to climb Everest via the North Rid ...

. In 1992 a joint Japanese-Kazakh expedition crossed the Pinnacles but were unable to continue to the summit. They found a body beyond the second pinnacle at approximately 8,200m on the Rongbuk side of the ridge. Photographs taken by Vladimir Suviga and sent to

Chris Bonington Sir Christian John Storey Bonington, CVO, CBE, DL (born 6 August 1934) is a British mountaineer. His career has included nineteen expeditions to the Himalayas, including four to Mount Everest. Early life and expeditions Bonington's father, ...

confirmed that the body was that of Peter Boardman. Joe Tasker's body has never been found. Not until 1995 did a team from a Japanese university, supported by a group of about 35 Sherpa porters, climb the entire northeast ridge route, including the Three Pinnacles in both directions. In order to facilitate the expedition, the Sherpas had covered virtually the entire route with

fixed rope In climbing and mountaineering, a fixed-rope (or fixed-line) is the practice of installing networks of in-situ anchored Climbing rope#Static rope, static climbing ropes on climbing routes to assist any following climbers (and Porter (carrier), po ...

s. Only after the ropes were in place did a group of Japanese go to the top. Even today this part of the vast mountain is almost always avoided, too great are its difficulties that range from the Pinnacles themselves to the weather, the extreme cold, the winds and the altitude as well as the arduous terrain. Almost all the mountaineering challenges on Mount Everest have now been overcome, but there remain three routes with extraordinary difficulties: a direttissima climb up the avalanche-prone East Face, a direttissima climb up the Southwest Face and ascent of the north pillar on the East Face over the (according to

George Mallory George Herbert Leigh-Mallory (18 June 1886 – 8 or 9 June 1924) was an English Mountaineering, mountaineer who participated in the first three British Mount Everest expeditions from the early to mid-1920s. He and climbing partner An ...

) so-called "Fantasy Ridge". This ridge ends at the centre of the northeast ridge – below the Three Pinnacles. A climber wishing to climb up the Fantasy Ridge on his way to the summit would have to negotiate the east ridge and then climb the Three Pinnacles on the northeast ridge.

Sources

* Stephen Venables: ''Everest, Kangshung Face''. Pan, 1991, * Roberto Mantovani und Kurt Diemberger: ''Mount Everest - Kampf in eisigen Höhen''. Moewig, 1997, * Stephen Venables: ''Everest - Die Geschichte seiner Erkundung''. Geo, Frederking und Thaler, 2003, {{Mount Everest Mount Everest