The Ogre

Some mountains are high; some mountains are hard. Few are both. On the afternoon of 13 July 1977, having become the first climbers to reach the summit of the Ogre, Doug Scott and Chris Bonington began their long descent. In the minutes that followed, any feeling of success from their achievement would be overwhelmed by the start of a desperate fight for survival. And things would only get worse. Rising to over 7,000 metres in the centre of the Karakoram, the Ogre Baintha Brakk is notorious in mountaineering circles as one of the most difficult mountains to climb. First summited by Scott and Bonington in 1977 on expedition with Paul Tut Braithwaite, Nick Estcourt, Clive Rowland and Mo Anthoine it waited almost twenty-four years for a second ascent, and a further eleven years for a third.