GILGIT: Shehroze Kashif scaled the eighth highest mountain Manaslu – 8,163 metres tall– in Nepal while Naila Kiani and Sirbaz Khan started their expedition from Camp 3 of the peak on Wednesday.

Naila Kiani and Sirbaz Khan will likely reach the top on Thursday or Friday, according to their tour operator.

Mr Kashif, a part of the Seven Summit Trek expedition team, started his summit push from Camp 3 on Tuesday. “With this remarkable achievement, Shehroze has not only reached the true summit of Manaslu but also has officially become the youngest climber in the world to summit 12 peaks above 8000 meters,” his Facebook page read.

Karrar Haidri, Alpine Club Pakistan secretary, said Shehroze Kashif’s commitment is admirable. “I hope he has a safe descent and more luck on his upcoming adventures,” said Karrar Haidri.

Shehroze Kashif had reached the summit on September 2021. However, two days later it was revealed that the “actual summit” was located 10 metres ahead. Consequently, he decided to scale the peak again. Having scaled the Broad Peak (8051m) — the world’s 12th highest peak — at the age of 17, Mr Kashif was termed “The Broad Boy”. However, his mountain-climbing career started at the age of 11. He became the youngest Pakistani to summit Mt Everest (8,849m) — the world’s highest peak — on May 11, 2021. He also became the world’s youngest climber to summit K2 on July 27, 2021, at the age of 19.

On May 5, 2022, he was the first Pakistani to reach the summit of Kangchenjunga (8,586m) — the world’s third-highest peak that lies on the Nepal and India border. On May 16, 2022, he summited the world’s fourth-highest peak, Mt Lhotse (8,516m), in Nepal.

In August 2022, Shehroze Kashif summited Gasherbrum-II (8,035m) and Gasherbrum-I, the 11th highest mountain in the world at 8,080 metres. In July 2022, he and Fazal Ali went missing between Camp 4 and Camp 3 after successfully summiting Nanga Parbat but were recovered shortly after.

The 21-year-old now needs to scale Cho Oyu and Shishapangma to complete his mission of summiting all the 14 eight-thousanders.

Published in Dawn, September 21st, 2023