Madrid, April 30: Spanish climber Tolo Calafat, who suffered swelling on the brain while descending Nepal’s famed Mount Annapurna in the Himalayas, died Thursday before he could be rescued, a climbing partner said.
“He is dead,” veteran Spanish climber Juanito Oiarzabal, who reached the summit of Mount Annapurna on Tuesday along with a third Spanish climber, told Spain’s National Radio station.
Calafat, a 39-year-old father of two from Majorca on Spain’s Balearic Islands, was no longer answering the satellite phone which he had used to speak with his family and call for help, he added.
He had been stuck and unable to move at 7,500 metres (24,000 feet) above sea level as bad weather hampered his rescue after he suffered a cerebral oedema.
A helicopter that went searching for him Thursday was not able to locate him, Oiarzabal said.
In 2008 another seasoned Spanish climber, Inaki Ochoa de Olza, died on the same mountain in similar circumstances.
Calafat and the two others climbed Annapurna at the same time as South Korea’s Oh Eun-Sun, who claimed to have become the first woman to to scale all 14 mountains in the world over 8,000 metres.
Oiarzabal, a veteran of 24 ascents of peaks over 8,000 metres, denounced what he said was a growing lack of “solidarity” amongst climbers, in a reference to the reluctance he said Oh’s team displayed to help Calafat.
He said Oh stopped Tuesday on her way down Annapurna at a camp located at 7,100 metres to allow her four Sherpas to go to the aid of Calafat.
But the Sherpas refused despite being offered 6,000 euros (8,000 dollars) each, Oiarzabal told Spanish media. He said he was prevented from going himself because his feet were partially frozen.
Oiarzabal was more critical on Wednesday, telling Cadena Ser that Oh “did not help at all, she did nothing, because according to her it was not her responsibility.”
Oh’s claim to have scaled all 14 mountains over 8,000 metres has been challenged by some experts, who doubt she reached the summit of Mount Kanchenjunga on the Nepal-Tibet border last year as claimed.
Her main rival in the race to make history, Spanish climber Edurne Pasaban, is preparing to climb Shisha Pangma in Tibet, the last peak on her list.
—Agencies