A Hungarian climber disappeared on Mount Everest

Hungarian climber Szilárd Suhajda vanished without a trace on Mount Everest. He left Camp 4 on his own two days ago, and none of the members of the expedition team has seen him ever since.

Missing Hungarian climber

Szilárd Suhajda set off for the 8,848-metre summit of Mount Everest in Nepal at 9 PM local time on Tuesday evening. At the time of publishing our story, the Hungarian climber has been missing for 45 hours. To make matters worse, he’s out there without emergency oxygen or personal Sherpa support, so he has to carry his equipment and cope with the elements entirely alone.

His beacon last showed his position on Wednesday evening. At that time, Suhajda was at the Hillary Staircase at an altitude of 8,795 metres. “Although it’s only 50 metres from the summit, it could take several hours to reach the highest peak,” said László Pintér, head of communications at the Hungarian Mountaineering and Sport Climbing Federation.

An expert told hvg.hu that Suhajda’s fellow climbers may have failed to notice him because his headlamp was broken. On Wednesday, the Hungarian mountaineer was still in contact with his staff at home. He said he was feeling determined and mentioned the great weather conditions.

Help is on the way

Suhajda had previously asked two Sherpas to move up from Camp 3 to Camp 4, where the Hungarian climber was scheduled to return. According to László Pintér, this is not a rescue mission, they are just waiting for Suhajda with fluids.

According to M4 Sport, the two Sherpas have already reached Camp 4. Here, they will conduct a search at the site. If there is still no sight of the Hungarian climber, they will stay up and alert in case he arrives to the camp throughout the night from the summit region.

In addition to Suhajda, a group of 12 climbers, including four Sherpas, set off to the summit of Mount Everest on the very same route as the Hungarian adventurer.

“During his Lhoce climb last year, he didn’t give a sign of life for two entire days, nor did he contact us when he reached the summit, even though he knew that we were on edge following his movement, based on the tracker. We assume that at this moment he must be slowly descending down the mountain as we can’t see his tracking data. We have no information on why the tracker is not working, but it’s best not to come up with scenarios too quickly,” writes László Pintér.