These Skiers Just Made the Most Impressive First Descent of the Decade

Christina Lustenberger, Jim Morrison, and Chantel Astorga just skied the line of a lifetime. After a stymied 2023 expedition to the Baltoro Muztagh region of Pakistan, Canadian ski mountaineer Christina Lustenberger and American Jim Morrison returned to the Trango Towers this April to ski the line of a lifetime. On May 9, with American Chantel Astorga, they climbed and skied the 20,623-foot Great Trango Tower’s West Face, which has only ever been attempted before by Lusti, as she’s known, and her party.

Their original teammate Nick McNutt wasn’t able to join the expedition this time around—his wife is expecting a child—so the team tapped Astorga, an avalanche forecaster and ace ski mountaineer with a resume of impressive climbs and descents from Alaska to Nepal and beyond.

The team spent four weeks waiting in basecamp for a weather window, making quick acclimatization trips from basecamp before storms rolled in and dropped significant amounts of snow.

Lusti was struck with food-borne illness and high altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE), but the turbulent weather actually helped her work with her doctor to recover before stable conditions allowed the team to safely reach their high camp. She had fallen ill on their previous attempt as well.

We spoke to Lusti on May 17 to talk about her team’s historic ski descent.

Outside: What was it like to go back to Pakistan?

It was a lot to go back, but we all thought it was important enough of a project to give it another shot. We believed it was possible. I spent almost eight weeks in Pakistan this spring. The first two weeks I was teaching backcountry skiing to six Pakistani girls, part of another project I was working on with The North Face. I then spent a week in Hunza waiting for the the Trango team to arrive. That time let me get grounded and comfortable in the country, instead of just racing up to basecamp.

That was just one of the ways I was able to take more pressure off myself in ways I couldn’t last year. I wanted to be successful on our line and our goal but also surrender to experiencing whatever the mountain would give us—allowing it to unfold. We were at basecamp for four weeks, and I got really sick again, diarrhea turned to HAPE symptoms. I was worried I’d have to descend again and the trip would be over. But the weather was unsettled and convective and so I had time to work with the expedition doctor and recover.

This team has shaken up a few times. How did you build the team that ended up summiting?

I first pitched this trip after our 2022 trip to Baffin Island. Originally, the team was going to consist of Hilaree Nelson, Brette Harrington, and Jim Morrison. After Hilaree’s accident, I wasn’t sure Jim would even be interested in big expedition-style skiing. But after some time he came to see this as an alluring objective. Then, we tried to get a team together of myself, Kiwi skier Sam Smoothy, Morrison, and Nick McNutt. But Sam couldn’t get a visa for the Baltoro region. Sam Anthamatten, another ski mountaineer on the North Face team also had visa issues and McNutt had to drop out for the birth of his kid. After last year I really wanted another woman on the team, and there aren’t a lot of people with the skills or desire to climb a technical alpine line and descend with skis on. But Chantel had obvious strengths in ice and mixed climbing, so she was a perfect fit.

Tell us about the climb. How did you get past the crux crevasse this time?

After I recovered from that sickness and I was able to acclimate during these short weather windows I started to get really anxious about time. You start to feel the urgency of how much time you have left. Looking at the weather you start to feel pressure that maybe this won’t happen. But at the very end, almost the last possible day, we had a really amazing weather window. It cleared for three days before we went to high camp and we were able to ascend with a lot more confidence than we had ever felt in these mountains. Leaving high camp felt really good.

Before getting up to the crux, we had a team fly drones high on the peak so we could study the line. When we arrived at the crevasse below the summit we built a snow anchor and I led across the snow bridge and worked my way out onto a rib. I was able to place two ice screws, cross some snow, and build another anchor to fix a line the other climbers could ascend. The route through it on the climbers left has broken ice and seracs that constantly fall away from the face. At that moment it felt like nothing would be able to stop us.

Up on the hanging glacier, the snow was quite deep. We had really nice powder turns up there. On the ramp system below we skied lots of breakable and some supportive crust. Getting back to high camp was all refrozen loud survival skiing. On this kind of line where you ski through lots of elevations you’ll find every kind of snow imaginable.

Did you approach objectives like Mount Sir Sanford this winter with Trango in the back of your mind? What kind of training did you focus on for this objective?

To be completely honest, I’ve had a lot of things shift in my life. I wasn’t that interested in skiing this winter, I was leaning into ice and mixed climbing to shake things up and get my head out of skiing. I wanted to be mentally and emotionally ready to arrive in Pakistan to do what needed to be done. Taking a break from skiing was probably the best thing I could’ve done to prepare. The ice climbing was incredibly engaging and got my head into a better place while also leveling up my skills in the mountains.

I’ve been skiing my whole life and to get joy out of the experience it has to be pretty intense—you just can’t do that all the time.

Not forcing anything was really good for me. Not forcing myself, not forcing conditions.

Source: https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/snow-sports/great-trango-tower-ski-descent/

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