Palung Ri SE ridge (02.05.1992)

The main objective of our group was the first ascent of the Cho Oyu NW ridge from Palung La. I reached the Palung La pass on April 27 alone and left a tent at the beginning of the glacier plateau below Palung La. After that I returned to BC. On May 2nd our advance team consisting of Uwe Koblitz, Michael Kinne and myself left the tent (reached from BC on May 1st) on the above-mentioned plateau at 9 am, traversed the slope above the glacier and then ascended towards a shoulder on the ridge which we reached around 11 am. One hundred meters below the summit, Uwe who had led the group up to that point turned back. Later he said that he had feared the onset of bad weather. I led from that moment to the summit which I reached around 1:30pm. Michael joined me 20 min. later. The ascent was easy, snow conditions were good, except for the first 100 vertical meters above the plateau where the ice was hard with loose snow on top. After the climb we returned to ABC, my partners continued to BC because of bad weather.
Uwe Koblitz with Christoph Zuleger (+) started their first ascent of the Cho Oyu NW ridge from Palung La on May 8 and reached camp 3 of the normal route on May 9. I climbed Cho Oyu from May 5, summited on May 8 and returned to ABC on May 9. Martin Lutterjohann