Tracee Metcalfe on the summit of Dhaulagiri, 2022 Photo: Courtesy of Tracee Metcalfe
On Friday, Tracee Metcalfe became the first U.S. woman to scale all 14 of the world’s 8,000m peaks. She did so by summiting Tibet’s Shisha Pangma. At 8,027m, it is the lowest of the 14.
“It was magical,” Metcalfe told ExplorersWeb. The 50-year-old internal medicine physician from Vail, Colorado, added some details about the summit day.
“Conditions were much different than last year,” Metcalfe said. “We did get a heavy snowfall last week and had over one meter of fresh snow in Base Camp. But this year, the snow was very heavy and wet, which bonded nicely and made avalanche risk much lower than last year.”
Metcalfe noted the last meters before the summit were the most intense.
“We reached a false summit that required traversing a cornice for about 180m,” she said. “Mingma G led the way on that part, [fixing] the rope as he advanced.”
Here is a video of Metcalfe’s arrival at the summit.
Angela Benavides graduated university in journalism and specializes in high-altitude mountaineering and expedition news. She has been writing about climbing and mountaineering, adventure and outdoor sports for 20+ years.
Prior to that, Angela Benavides spent time at/worked at a number of local and international media. She is also experienced in outdoor-sport consultancy for sponsoring corporations, press manager and communication executive, and a published author.
