Eight-thousander

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The eight-thousanders are the fourteen independent<ref name="independent">In making any "highest mountains" list, one needs to use a criterion to exclude subpeaks and only list independent mountains. There is no universally agreed-upon such criterion. However the (generally accepted) list of fourteen eight-thousanders is obtained if one uses a topographic prominence cutoff of between 200 and 500 meters (610 and 1524 feet). Some eight-thousand meter subpeaks have been climbed as goals in themselves, for example Lhotse Middle, but this is quite rare.</ref> mountains on Earth that are more than 8,000 metres (26,427 feet) above sea level. They are all located in the Himalayan and Karakoram mountain ranges in Asia.

The first attempt on an eight-thousander took place on the expedition by Albert F. Mummery, William Cecil Slingsby and J. Norman Collie to Nanga Parbat in 1895; this ended in failure, when Mummery and two Ghurkas, Ragobir and Goman Singh, were killed by an avalanche.

The first successful ascent of an eight-thousander was by Maurice Herzog and Louis Lachenal, who reached the summit of Annapurna on June 3, 1950.

The first person to climb all fourteen eight-thousanders was Reinhold Messner. He completed this task on October 16, 1986. One year later, in 1987, Jerzy Kukuczka was the second man to do so, and as of 2005, a total of thirteen people have done the same. This is an extremely hazardous feat; at least four people have died while close to completing the full list.

[edit] List of eight-thousanders

Peak	Height	Location	First Ascent	First ascensionist(s)	Ascents^*	Deaths^*	Death rate^*	Death rate before 1990^*	Death rate since 1990^*
Everest	8850 m	Tibet/Nepal	May 29, 1953	Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay	1924	179	9.30%	37%	4.4%
K2	8611 m	Xinjiang/Pakistan<ref name="kashmir">Note: The mountains mentioned lie in the disputed Northern Areas region. This region is also claimed by India along with Kashmir.</ref>	July 31, 1954	Achille Compagnoni and Lino Lacedelli	198	53	26.77%	41%	19.7%
Kanchenjunga	8586 m	India/Nepal	May 25, 1955	George Band and Joe Brown	185	40	21.62%	21%	22%
Lhotse	8516 m	Tibet/Nepal	May 18, 1956	Fritz Luchsinger and Ernst Reiss	243	11	4.53%	14%	2%
Makalu	8463 m	Tibet/Nepal	May 15, 1955	Jean Couzy and Lionel Terray	206	22	10.68%	16%	8.5%
Cho Oyu	8201 m	Tibet/Nepal	October 19, 1954	Joseph Joechler, Pasang Dawa Lama, and Herbert Tichy	1400	35	2.50%	7%	2%
Dhaulagiri	8167 m	Nepal	May 13, 1960	Kurt Diemberger, Peter Diener, Nawang Dorje, Nima Dorje, Ernst Forrer, and Albin Schelbert	313	56	17.89%	31%	11%
Manaslu	8163 m	Nepal	May 9, 1956	Toshia Imanishi and Gyalzen Norbu	240	52	21.67%	35.16%	13.42%
Nanga Parbat	8125 m	Pakistan<ref name="kashmir" />	July 3, 1953	Hermann Buhl	216	61	28.24%	77%	5.5%
Annapurna	8091 m	Nepal	June 3, 1950	Maurice Herzog, Louis Lachenal	130	53	40.77%	66%	19.71%
Gasherbrum I	8068 m	Xinjiang/Pakistan<ref name="kashmir" />	July 5, 1958	Andrew Kauffman, Peter Schoening	195	21	10.77%	15.5%	8.75%
Broad Peak	8047 m	Xinjiang/Pakistan<ref name="kashmir" />	June 9, 1957	Hermann Buhl, Kurt Diemberger, Marcus Schmuck, and Fritz Wintersteller	255	18	7.20%	5%	8.6%
Gasherbrum II	8035 m	Xinjiang/Pakistan<ref name="kashmir" />	July 8, 1956	Josef Larch, Fritz Moravec, Hans Willenpart	650	17	2.62%	7.8%	0.44%
Shishapangma	8027 m	Tibet	May 2, 1964	Ten climbers led by Hsu Ching	201	19	9.45%	2%	16.8%

^* As of September 2003, data from Chinese National Geography 2006.8, page 77.

[edit] Climbers who have reached the summit of all eight-thousanders

	Name	Period	Nationality
1	Reinhold Messner	1970-1986	Italian
2	Jerzy Kukuczka	1979-1987	Polish
3	Erhard Loretan	1982-1995	Swiss
4	Carlos Carsolio	1985-1996	Mexican
5	Krzysztof Wielicki	1980-1996	Polish
6	Juanito Oiarzabal	1985-1999	Spanish/Basque
7	Sergio Martini	1976-2000	Italian
8	Hong-Gil Um	1988-2000	Korean
9	Park Young Seok	1993-2001	Korean
10	Alberto Inurrategi	1991-2002	Spanish/Basque
11	Han Wang Yong	1994-2003	Korean
12	Ed Viesturs	1989-2005	American
13	Alan Hinkes	1987-2005	British