Industry News
A team of three skiers, consisting of Jim Morrison, Christina Lustenberger, and Chantel Astorga successfully completed the first-ever ski descent of Great Trango Towers in Pakistan on May 9, 2024. The vertical faces of Trango Towers are among the world’s tallest cliffs, and the climb is considered one of the world’s hardest. The team around Jim Morrison attempted the descent on skis last year but had to abandon the quest after three failed attempts.
The Trango Towers lie on a northwest to southeast-running ridge in Pakistan. Two glaciers enclose the range: Trango Glacier to the west and the Dunge Glacier to the east. The team around Morrison climbed the Great Trango massif which has three peaks, Main at 20,623 feet of altitude, East at 20,443 feet of altitude, and West at 20,417 feet of altitude. The mountain range was first climbed in 1977 but the majority of succesful ascents occured in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
The expedition under Jim Morrison’s leadership was sponsored by The North Face. “We sent it,” the American ski mountaineer shared on Instagram. “I shared this summit view of the Karakoram’s highest and most prolific peaks with two amazing women, Christina Lustenberger and Chantel Astorga. It’s not lost on me that these two badass women were big inspirations to Hilaree, and I felt her spirit strongly as we climbed onto the precarious summit.” Morrison had lost his life partner Hilaree Nelson during their ski descent of Manaslu in 2022. The pair had been the first people to ski from the 27,940-foot summit of Lhotse in 2018.
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