Jirishanca, Southeast Buttress Attempt. The Tirolean Andean Expedition consisted of Dr. Kurt Schoisswohl, Carlo Angreiter, Heinz Coleselli, Erwin Murg, Egon and Georg Wurm, Heinz Wurzer, Franz Oppurg, Hartwig Erdenkäufer, Richard Gerin and me as leader. On June 26 we arrived in Chiquián, where it took three days to get animals for the three-day pack-trip to Base Camp at Carhuacocha. Bad weather from January to April and in June had changed the mountain terribly. The usually rock buttress was now a compact, unclimbable ice wall; we could not hope to climb the south-southeast buttress and turned left to find a route which would ascend an east-facing wall to the southeast ridge, which ended in the wall of the summit mass. At Base Camp at 13,575 feet it rained for six days, but we managed to stock Camp I at 16,000 feet. The adjacent icefall, which had caused the Tiroleans five years ago no serious problems, took four days of hard work and some fixed rope. Parts were dangerous because of avalanches and rockfall and had to be done at night. Eight days after our arrival we had Camp II above the icefall at 17,300 feet in an eight-man ice cave at the foot of the southeast face. The weather improved and we attacked the rock buttress that led to the ridge. The buttress is up to UIAA VI-difficulty in the lower part. The upper part is of the steepest ice, threatened by séracs. We fixed the route to the ridge in six days and calculated we needed three more for the corniced, dangerous ridge and two or three for the summit wall. Unfortunately the weather turned bad, unseasonably warm. Just after the lead group had returned to Camp I from high on the mountain and before their relief had set out, a giant avalanche swept the face and icefall. The route between Camps I and II was overwhelmed. We all descended to Base Camp, where it rained for three days and stayed so warm that we could see that the summit was out of the question. On the fourth night we evacuated Camps I and II. On the trip in we had climbed Jirishanca Chico Este (17,290 feet).

Jürgen Gumpold, Gipfelstürmer (Austria)