Body of famed ski mountaineer Hilaree Nelson from Colorado found near peak of Mount Manaslu
The body of famed ski climber Hilaree Nelson from Colorado was recovered in Nepal. The 49-year-old from Telluride was skiing down from the summit of the world's eighth highest mountain with her partner when she disappeared.
Jim Morrison, her partner, said in an Instagram post that they were skiing down from the 26,775-foot summit of Mount Manaslu when Nelson triggered a small avalanche.
Crews searched for several days before finding her body on Wednesday. Bad weather had hampered the rescue efforts.
Nelson's body was flown to Kathmandu where doctors will perform an autopsy.
The Kathmandu-based Shangri-La Nepal Trek organized and outfitted the expedition.
Also Monday, an avalanche at a lower elevation on Mount Manaslu swept several climbers, killing a Nepali guide and injuring others. All of the climbers caught in that avalanche were accounted for. Some of the injured were flown to Kathmandu and were being treated in hospitals.
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Nelson and Morrison, from Tahoe, California, had been an extreme skiing pair that summited Mount Lhotse, the world's fourth-highest, in 2018.
The North Face sponsored Nelson.
"We are in touch with Hilaree's family and supporting search and rescue efforts in every way we can," the company said in an Instagram post on Tuesday.
"Most prolific ski mountaineer of her generation"
Nelson, 49, had a career spanning two decades and was described on the company's website as "the most prolific ski mountaineer of her generation."
In 2012, she became the first woman to summit the highest mountain in the world, Everest, and its adjacent Lhotse within 24 hours.
Six years later, she returned to Lhotse and made the first ski descent of the mountain, which earned her the National Geographic Adventurer of the Year award.
In an Instagram post last week, Nelson said her latest climb had been deeply challenging because of "incessant rain" and dangerous conditions.
"I haven't felt as sure-footed on Manaslu as I have on past adventure into the thin atmosphere of the high Himalaya," Nelson said in an Instagram post on Thursday.
"These past weeks have tested my resilience in new ways."
