Everest, twice

Temba’s team pooled together what little money they had and set out from Kathmandu toward Lukla and the Everest region. After nearly two months of trekking and acclimatizing, and with supplies running low, they committed to a summit push.

Exhausted from three nights at Camp 4 — 7,925 metres, inside the Death Zone — the team pushed on. By the time they reached the Hillary Step after ten to eleven hours of climbing, Temba had lost all sensation in his fingers. Bad weather and depleted oxygen forced a turn-back just twenty-two metres from the top.

He returned to Kathmandu with severe frostbite. Doctors amputated three fingers on his right hand and two on his left.

Two weeks after turning sixteen, Temba returned to Everest — this time from the North Ridge in Tibet, with a better-equipped and more experienced team. He credits Thamserku Trekking and climbing partner Sonam Sherpa with making the second attempt possible.

On the clear morning of 23 May 2001, at around eight o’clock, he reached the summit. The Government of Nepal and Guinness World Records recognized him as the youngest person to climb Mount Everest — a national record that, under current age restrictions for the mountain, still stands. The wider Guinness title was later surpassed by Jordan Romero, who summited from Tibet at age thirteen in 2010.

Before his first expedition, Temba had met King Birendra of Nepal, who told him not to push himself too hard and that they would meet again after the climb. The King and much of the royal family were killed in the palace massacre of 1 June 2001 — just days after Temba’s own summit, and a meeting that never came to pass.