73-year-old becomes oldest woman to climb Mount Everest

Her conquests include Mount McKinley in Alaska, the Eiger in Switzerland and
Lhotse, the fourth-tallest mountain in the world, which is also in Nepal.

In 2002, she completed her first ascent of Everest to become, at the age of
63, the oldest woman to stand on the peak. The oldest man to reach the
summit is Nepalese climber Min Bahadur Sherchan, who was 76 when he
completed the climb in 2008.

Ang Tshering said Everest has been buffeted by high winds in recent days but
Watanabe and her team had been able to confirm that they were safe and were
descending from the peak. The winds are forecast to weaken towards the end
of the week and the climbers are expected to have returned to base camp by
Saturday.

“It has been a very hard climb and it has been made harder by the
weather, but she had a good team,” he added.

In addition to the four who reached the summit, a further six climbers in the
party will attempt to scale the peak in the coming days, he said.

Ms Watanabe’s bid had been driven by a rivalry with another Japanese climber,
Eiko Funahashi, who was similarly aiming to set the record for being the
oldest woman to reach the summit. Ms Funahashi, 72, was last reported to be
awaiting a break in the weather before attempting the southeast ridge route,
which is considered the easiest route to the top.

Ms Funahashi had failed in two previous efforts to reach the peak, in 2006 and
2010.

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