ISLAMABAD: The world mountaineers’ community and adventurers expressed their shock and grief over the death of another renowned Pakistani mountaineer Ali Raza Sadpara who was laid to rest on Friday.
He fell last week off a cliff while climbing a mountain in Skardu. He was 56. This is the second such incident in two years in which a Pakistani mountaineer’s death was reported.
Last year in February, Pakistan’s world-recognized high altitude mountaineer Ali Sadpara had gone missing and later believed dead while attempting K-2 ascent. He was 45 years old.
Ali Raza Sadpara was a vetern mountaineer and also coached the younger Sadpara, Hassan Sadpara and others.
Secretary Alpine Club of Pakistan, Karrar Haidri while talking to Gulf News said Sadpara was summiting a mountain, a usual exercise the mountain climberd do to acclimatize themselves when he slipped from a high altitude cliff.
He was also part of Pakistan’s first woman mountaineer, a Dubai-based banker Naila Kiani’s team and they successfully climbed the world’s 13th highest mountain, Gasherbrum-II, which stands at over 8,000 meters above sea level, told Haidri.
His funeral prayers were offered on Friday morning in his village Olding.
When he fell off the cliff, he was taken to the District Headquarters Hospital in Skardu for treatment where doctors found his spinal cord fractured and ribs broken.
Scheduled to ascend K2
Sadpara was scheduled to attempt an ascent of K2, the world’s second-highest peak, a summer that he had not so far scaled despite a few attempts and according to Haidri, last time he was short of only a few hundred feet, when he had to return due to bad weather.
Sadpara started his career in 1986 and had climbed Pakistan’s 8,000-metre peaks 17 times. Among his conquests were Broad Peak (8,047m), Gasherbrum-II (8,035m), Gasherbrum-I (8,068m) and Nanga Parbat (8,125m).
Besides those, he also climbed Sia Kangri, Baltoro Kangri and Spantik.
In a statement issued by PPP’s media cell, Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari extended his condolences to Sadpara’s family and prayed for the deceased soul.
Minister for Climate Change Sherry Rehman also expressed grief over his death.
Sadpara’s passing was “surely a great loss for Pakistan,” said she.
“His legacy lives on in the generation of mountaineers he trained over the course of his courageous life. My thoughts and prayers are with the bereaved family. May his soul rest in peace,” Sherry said on Twitter.
Luke Smithwick, American climber and skier, shared a picture of Ali Raza on his Twitter which he said was taken last summer while climbing Gasherbrum-II. “He was with another team yet we all worked together on 8000 metre mountains, that’s how summits happen.”
