At 19:00 GMT -4 on 17th January 2024 the second ALE team of the season summited Mount Sidley. This was less than two weeks after the first team. This is my second blog on Mount Sidley – January 2024
The second team was much smaller with just one guide and four climbers. One of the climbers became the oldest person to summit Mount Sidley. Another completed both his V7S round and a V7S/7S (Bass version) double.

The guide was American, Jared Vilhauer, who is a native of Colorado. He was accompanied by:
- Ryszard Pawłowski (who at 73 became the oldest person to climb Mount Sidley) and Tomasz Bryl (both from Poland and the first from that nation);
- Marius Purice (who completed the V7S and the V7S/7S double) (Romania); and
- Kathryn Gilson (USA) for whom Mount Sidley was the third of the V7S.
Whilst the first team seemed to have had a relatively smooth climb and good weather throughout, this was not the case for the second team. Being a smaller team, they travelled to Sidley in a Twin Otter (rather than the Basler). It seems as though the first team had left a fuel cache at the mountain because, this time, there wasn’t the need to stop half-way to refuel.
So it looks as though ALE have stopped landing their Twin Otter in the crater now. Instead they opted for an approach further to the north-east, like recent trips. This is a longer but slightly less steep approach. The aeroplane landed about 8km from the base of the mountain.
Having successfully summited, the team was caught in a storm. That meant they had to spend almost 48 hours in high camp before they were able to return to the Twin Otter.
Ryszard Pawłowski is one of the greats of Himalayan mountaineering. He climbed 10 of the 8000m peaks of the world between 1979 and 1987 (plus the central summit of Shishipangma). This included Mount Everest five times. He climbed with many great Polish climbers and was with Jerzy Kukuczka when he tragically died on Lhotse in 1989. Perhaps the V7S project is a suitable activity for class climbers in their dotage.
Both Ryszard Pawlowski and Tomasz Bryl just have Ojos del Salado to climb in order to complete the V7S. This is planned for later in the year.

Marius Purice climbed Mount Vinson on this same trip. He is still looking to complete the Messner version of the Seven Summits. After his Antarctica climbs he said that the project “has produced profound beneficial effects in my personal evolution, physically, mentally and spiritually. I am happy and grateful that I went through both circuits without major incidents and thanks to many people without whom I would not have succeeded…. I hope that this success will inspire, as in my case, as many enthusiastic climbers as possible in overcoming their personal limits, to the highest level.”

My updated list of Mount Sidley climbers is below. As is my practice, summiters are listed in alphabetical order by date (but with the guide(s) named first) without regard to who may have reached the summit first. I will write a further blog on the current V7S completers in the next few weeks.
Date | Name | Group | Nationality | |
---|---|---|---|---|
1. | 11/01/1990 | Bill Atkinson | Panter Group | New Zealand |
2. | 12/01/1990 | Bill McIntosh | Panter Group | USA |
3. | 12/01/1990 | Kurt Panter | Panter Group | USA |
21/01/1994 | Bill McIntosh (second ascent) | Dunbar/ McIntosh | USA | |
4. | 21/01/1994 | Nelia Dunbar | Dunbar/ McIntosh | USA |
5. | 21/01/1994 | Thom Wilch | Dunbar/ McIntosh | USA |
6. | 21/01/1994 | Tony Teeling | Dunbar/ McIntosh | New Zealand |
7. | 23/01/2011 | Scott Woolums | ALE #1 | USA |
8. | 23/01/2011 | Aleks Abramov | ALE #1 | Russia |
9. | 23/01/2011 | Crina “Coco” Popescu | ALE #1 | Romania |
10. | 23/01/2011 | Mario Trimeri | ALE #1 | Italy |
11. | 01/01/2012 | Mike Roberts | Roberts Group | New Zealand |
12. | 01/01/2012 | Jennifer Erxleben | Roberts Group | USA |
13. | 01/01/2012 | Andrew Lloyd | Roberts Group | USA |
14. | 01/01/2012 | John Paul O’Donnell | Roberts Group | Ireland |
15. | 18/01/2013 | David Hamilton | ALE #2 | UK (Scotland) |
16. | 18/01/2013 | Vyacheslav Adrov | ALE #2 | Russia |
17. | 18/01/2013 | Paul Nicholson | ALE #2 | Canada |
18. | 18/01/2013 | Olga Rumyantseva | ALE #2 | Russia |
19. | 18/01/2013 | Vitaly Simonovich | ALE #2 | Russia |
20. | 28/12/2013 | Dylan Taylor | ALE #3 | USA |
21. | 28/12/2013 | Ilya Bykov | ALE #3 | Russia |
22. | 28/12/2013 | Sophie Cairns | ALE #3 | UK (England)/Hong Kong |
23. | 28/12/2013 | Liana Chabdarova | ALE #3 | Russia |
24. | 28/12/2013 | Andre Filkov | ALE #3 | Russia |
25. | 17/01/2014 | Francois Michel Bernard | ALE #4 | France |
26. | 17/01/2014 | Rob Smith | ALE #4 | UK (Northern Ireland) |
27. | 17/01/2014 | John Dodelande | ALE #4 | France |
28. | 17/01/2014 | Philipp Lehner | ALE #4 | Austria |
29. | 17/01/2014 | Christian de Marliave | ALE #4 | France |
30. | 17/01/2014 | Joachim Marte | ALE #4 | Austria |
31. | 17/01/2014 | Jean Frederik Paulsen | ALE #4 | Sweden |
32. | 17/01/2014 | Alexander Svaetichin | ALE #4 | Sweden |
17/01/2014 | Scott Woolums (second ascent) | ALE #4 | USA | |
33. | 14/01/2017 | Tre-C Dumas | ALE #5 | USA |
34. | 14/01/2017 | Christoph Hoebenreich | ALE #5 | Austria |
35. | 14/01/2017 | Dan Bull | ALE #5 | Australia |
36. | 14/01/2017 | Jarryd Commerford | ALE #5 | USA/UK (England)/IRE |
37. | 14/01/2017 | Michael Guggolz | ALE #5 | Germany |
38. | 14/01/2017 | Robbi Malandreniotis | ALE #5 | UK (England)/Greece |
39. | 14/01/2017 | James Stone | ALE #5 | UK (England/Australia) |
40. | 14/01/2018 | Nate Opp | ALE #6 | USA |
41. | 14/01/2018 | Cheryl Bart | ALE #6 | Australia |
42. | 14/01/2018 | Nikki Bart | ALE #6 | Australia |
43. | 14/01/2018 | Theodore Fairhurst | ALE #6 | Canada |
44. | 14/01/2018 | Katie Sarah | ALE #6 | Australia |
45. | 15/01/2019 | Fred Alldredge | ALE #7 | USA |
46. | 15/01/2019 | Maria Paz (Pachi) Ibarra | ALE #7 | Chile |
47. | 15/01/2019 | Vladislav Lachkarev | ALE #7 | Russia |
48. | 15/01/2019 | Satyarup Siddhanta | ALE #7 | India |
49. | 15/01/2019 | Sándor (Sanya) Tóth | ALE #7 | Hungary |
50. | 18/01/2020 | Andrew Chapman | ALE #8 | UK (England) |
51. | 18/01/2020 | Josh Hoeschen | ALE #8 | USA |
52. | 18/01/2020 | Vaughan de la Harpe | ALE #8 | South Africa |
53. | 18/01/2020 | Andrew Hughes | ALE #8 | USA |
54. | 18/01/2020 | Arthur Marsden | ALE #8 | South Africa |
55. | 18/01/2020 | Oleg Mezentsev | ALE #8 | Russia |
56. | 18/01/2020 | Donald O’Connor | ALE #8 | South Africa |
57. | 18/01/2020 | David Roskelley | ALE #8 | USA |
58. | 18/01/2020 | Roxanne Vogel | ALE #8 | USA |
59. | 18/01/2020 | Rob Williams | ALE #8 | South Africa |
60. | 22/12/2021 | Scott Webster | ALE #9 | UK (Scotland) |
61. | 22/12/2021 | Tom Weston | ALE #9 | UK (England) |
62. | 22/12/2021 | Fahd Abu Aisha | ALE #9 | Egypt |
63. | 22/12/2021 | James Allen | ALE #9 | Australia |
64. | 22/12/2021 | Stephan Jesinghaus | ALE #9 | Germany |
65. | 22/12/2021 | Yousef Al Refaie | ALE #9 | Kuwait |
66. | 22/12/2021 | Delia Zanoschi | ALE #9 | Romania |
67. | 22/12/2021 | Iulia Zanoschi | ALE #9 | Romania |
68. | 17/01/2023 | Eli Potter | ALE #10 | USA |
69. | 17/01/2023 | Adrian Ahritculesei | ALE #10 | Romania |
70. | 17/01/2023 | Marie-Pier Desharnais | ALE #10 | Canada |
71. | 17/01/2023 | Caroline Leon | ALE #10 | Australia |
72. | 17/01/2023 | Robert Gropel | ALE #10 | Australia |
73. | 18/01/2023 | Celine Jaccard | ALE #10 | Switzerland |
74. | 18/01/2023 | Thierry Dewambrechies | ALE #10 | France |
75. | 18/01/2023 | Nilavishek Mukherjee | ALE #10 | India |
76. | 18/01/2023 | Vambola Sipelgas | ALE #10 | Estonia |
77. | 18/01/2023 | Jaime Viñals | ALE #10 | Guatemala |
78. | 04/01/2024 | Larry Holmgren | ALE#11 | USA |
79. | 04/01/2024 | Evgenii Federov | ALE#11 | Russia |
80. | 04/01/2024 | Ludmila Korobeshko | ALE#11 | Russia |
81. | 04/01/2024 | Andrey Kravchenko | ALE#11 | Russia |
82. | 04/01/2024 | Yury Lukyanov | ALE#11 | Kazakhstan |
83. | 04/01/2024 | Oleg Pipkov | ALE#11 | Russia |
84. | 04/01/2024 | Igor Rebelskiy | ALE#11 | Russia |
85. | 04/01/2024 | Nikolay Tomchak | ALE#11 | Russia |
86. | 04/01/2024 | Sergei Vasiliev | ALE#11 | Russia |
87. | 17/01/2024 | Jared Vilhauer | ALE#12 | USA |
88. | 17/01/2024 | Tomasz Bryl | ALE#12 | Poland |
89. | 17/01/2024 | Kathryn Gilson | ALE#12 | USA |
90. | 17/01/2024 | Ryszard Pawłowski | ALE#12 | Poland |
91. | 17/01/2024 | Marius Purice | ALE#12 | Romania |
My earlier blog about the first January 2024 Sidley ascent is here. I am grateful for the help provided to me by Marius Purice and Tomasz Bryl in providing me with information that enabled me to write this blog.
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