Thane mountaineer dies while descending Mt Everest

THANE: Thane-based moutaineer Anjali Kulkarni, 54, died while descending from the summit of Mt Everest on Wednesday evening. She was part of a six-member expedition that included her husband, Sharad .
While the Nepal Tourism Department said they cannot release a statement yet, an expedition organiser said that the couple had finished their summit on Wednesday morning and were on their way down when Anjali succumbed due to "energy loss" and "heavy traffic" before reaching Camp IV.
With more than 200 climbers taking advantage of clear weather to attempt to summit Everest from both Nepal and China, Wednesday had turned out to be one of the busiest-ever days at the icy mountain. Teams of mountaineers had to line up for hours to reach the top, risking frostbite and altitude sickness and a huge queue had formed near the summit.
An American named Donald Lynn Cash, 55, collapsed at the summit on Wednesday while taking photographs while Kulkarni, according to expedition organisers, succumbed to ill health even as sherpa guides were bringing her down from 'Balcony'--the point at which climbers change oxygen cylinders-to Camp IV.
"There are eight to nine sherpas who are guiding the team down from Camp IV. We are also in the process of sending choppers to airlift the expedition team members," said Thupden Sherpa of Nepal's Arun Treks, which had organised the expedition.
An avid marathoner and experienced climber with a course from Darjeeling's Himalayan Mountaineering Institute to boot, Anjali had climbed several peaks including Mt Elbrus, Mt Kilimanjaro, Mt Lobuche, Mt Mera, Mt Stok Kangri, Kailash Mansarovar and Adi Kailash and had even undertaken many treks in the Himalayas apart from local treks in Maharashtra.
She used to run an advertising firm called Rx Communications with her husband. The couple retired from the ad world to pursue their dream of summiting Mt Everest. "They had been preparing for this climb for two years now and had even undergone a special pre-Everest training at Leh, informed Surendra Shelke, a senior mountaineer who knew the Kulkarnis closely.
Anjali is survived by her son, Shantanu and daughter-in-law, Isha.
The news of her demise came as a shock to fellow mountaineers. "It is a sad day for Indian mountaineering," said climber Ameet Singh who knew the Kulkarnis as a rare couple where both the husband and wife enjoyed mountains and were "ambitious" enough to do things together.
"They have climbed Mt Kilimanjaro in the past and another smaller mountain in the Everest region. They both wanted to do Everest together," said Singh, adding that nothing was left to chance. "Their fitness level was good. Besides, there was no bad weather, no contention on availability of sherpas. This is a sad turn of events," said Singh, pointing out that more than 70% of deaths on Mt Everest happen after you have finished the summit. "That's the nature of the beast," he said.