But there was more: A story arrived about horses that could have saved Capt. Scott’s life in Antarctica; Bear Grylls' outfitter confirmed the TV host did not fly over Everest; ExWeb sorted out the meaning of a world circumnavigation and broke the news that Thuraya is about to open Southeast Asia. Finally, news came from Peak Lenin about a pretty gruesome effect of global warming.

A Magic Summit Night on the Mountaineers' Mountain It was a magic summit night. Side by side, climbers from Europe, Iran, Pakistan, US, Korea and Nepal pushed through deep snow, whispering to different Gods. Below, base camp managers visited with each other for news. Radios crackled; carrying breathless voices of all languages through cold, thin air. Once in a while, the jingle of a satellite connection broke through the dark, shooting up in space and then back down to webmasters' flickering screens. News came up - and around the globe - a faceless audience followed with bated breath. Not one brand athlete was to be found on the vicious slopes. There were no celebrities climbing "for themselves" before cameras of big TV shows. What kept us up that night were unknown people, meeting on neutral grounds - with nothing in common but one goal: The roof of the world's most dreaded mountain. And then, there it was - triumph. Roaring from K2's summit like never before. Leaving us to wonder: if stripped of the presidents, commerce, fame and clergymen - is this how great we are? We knew it probably wouldn't last - but for a split second it was there - and ExWeb captured the moment.

Sherpa climber lost at the Bottleneck Korean team member Nima Nurbu from Thame fell to his death from the Bottleneck. He had set off from C4 2 hours before the Russian team. In the darkness, he slipped on the way up. Another Sherpa and an Italian climber tried to grab him, but couldn't stop him from falling hundreds of meters down the south face.

Italian climber missing Stefano Zavka from the Italian Mountain Freedom expedition is missing after summiting K2 on Friday. He was last seen above the Bottleneck. The family now calls to climbers to check C4, where Stefano might be located without means of communication.

17 Friday summits on K2 There were 17 confirmed summits on K2 Friday. Russians Nikolay Kadoshnikov, Victor Afanasyev, Aleksander Eliseev, and Roman Gubanov were the first to top-out, at about 3.30 p.m., local time on artificial oxygen. The guys spent a night on descent in an ice cave! Americans Chris Warner and Bruce Normand, and Portuguese Joao Garcia followed, with Don Bowie arriving at 4:45 p.m., approximately at the same time that Czech Libor Uher (via the Cesen route). One Korean woman and two Sherpas, were reported on top as well - but that has not been confirmed, instead two Korean men - Kim Jin Tae and Kim Zhang Ho - are confirmed, plus Iranian Kazem Faridian, Italians Daniele Nardi, Mario Vielmo & Stefano Zavka. All except for Libor climbed via the Abruzzi (SE) Spur.

Hugues back: "Oh, the horrible wind" French Hugues d’Aubarede turned back from C4 as he couldn't feel his feet (that he already had surgery done to after previous frostbites) in the bitter cold.

K2 – a dangerous place K2 is dubbed The Mountaineers' Mountain for good reason: K2's files on AdventureStats (updated Friday) register 269 summits, and 65 casualties, setting the death to summit rate on 24%. 23 of the mortal accidents on the mountain were due to climbers falling, a much larger number than those (13) who died in avalanches.

Broad Peak: Summits and Markus' body found Georg Kronthaler found the remains of his brother Markus near the foresummit on Friday and is now bringing him down to rest. That same day several teams reached the top – Gerfried Goeschl’s and Carlos Soria (68) among them.

Italians summit GII via its north face - a first complete ascent – traverse down the south side Italians Karl Unterkircher, Daniele Bernasconi, and Michele Compagnoni summited GII via the north spur, achieving the first complete ascent of the mountain’s north side. The climbers summited at 8:00 p.m. on Friday, and then traversed down the south side. They reached safely C1 on Saturday.

Avalanche on GII: One climber lost, one missing, Hirotaka badly injured Four members of Amical's expedition were hit by an avalanche on GII Wednesday, between C2 and C3. Although injured, team leader Dirk Groeger managed to reach the surface by his own power. Members from other expeditions immediately set off from C2 and hurried up to help Amical's climbers, rescuing two. Hirotaka survived; while the second climber died of his injuries. A fourth climber has not yet been recovered. Helicopter pilots were unable to land near C2 that day – Hiro was carried down to C1, where he was finally picked up on Thursday, and evacuated to Skardu. He is currently being airlifted to a larger hospital in Islamabad.

Gondogoro La closed The Gondogoro La is closed and will remain so for the 2007 season. The glacier has moved down, creating a huge crevasse. Some trekkers therefore cross the technical Ali Muhammad Jangju pa Pass (5,689m), which got its name from the local mountaineer who scaled GII and who was also the first to cross the Gondogoro Pass. Two who did were Lithuanian Saulius Vilius and girlfriend Ruta Tolpezninkaite, who reached BP's BC from Hushe Valley, crossing the much more difficult and heavily crevassed Jangju pa Pass in 13 hours, including a sleepover on the col and fixed ropes.

Suicide attack in Islamabad 12 persons have been killed and a number of people wounded in a suicide attack on a stage prepared for the Chief Justice of Pakistan address to the Islamabad Bar. No big security issues are however reported from the city and the debriefing sessions are on as usual at ACP.

Hungarian on Hidden Peak’s top Laszlo Mecs, member of the Hungarian K2 and Gasherbrum 1 expedition reached the summit of the Hidden Peak on Friday 11:30 local time.

Rescues on K2’s west face Victor Kozlov’s Russian team on K2’s west face was involved in a rescue since Sunday, until Wednesday morning. Member Vitaly Ivanov, sick with AMS had to be helped down from above C3 and was airlifted out by Pakistan chopper. A report about a second West Face rescue was incorrect.

Nanga Parbat summits! Chileans Luis Álvarez, Ernesto Olivares, Andrés Jonquera, Pablo Gutierrez and Cristian García-Huidobro; Polish female climber Kinga Baranowska and her Spanish mate Roberto 'Gorri' Rojo; and Slovak climbers Martin Gablik and Anton Suchy – all summited Nanga Parbat on July 18.

Carlos Pauner: Let’s go for GII – or not After summiting Broad Peak, Spaniard Carlos Pauner and his team moved to GII, hoping to achieve a second 8000+ meters summit this season. However, Carlos changed his mind after Wednesday’s avalanche. The team is now on their way back home.

Tango for two on Trango - Russian new route double before Broad Peak! A Krasnoyarsk team of four climbers nailed a double success on Trango last week. The guys finished the Ukrainian route, which merged nicely with a new route made by their mates a few days before. Next, they’re attempting Broad Peak.

Nangpa La champ Pavle Kozjek opens "Stonehenge" in Cordillera Huayhuash His new route on Cho Oyu got the public's award at the Piolet d'Or Ceremony last year. His images of Tibetan refugees shot dead by border guards at Nangpa La stirred the world. For both feats, Pavle Kojzek was chosen the Best of 2006 by ExplorersWeb. A few weeks back the Slovenian climber was back doing what he likes best: He finished his eighth new big-wall route in the Peruvian Andes. He teamed up with Grega Kresal to open a new route up the east face of Puscanturpa East (5,410m)

US rock climber Michael Reardon perished in Ireland After scaling a cliff, US free climber Michael Reardon was swept out to sea near Valentia, Ireland.

Outfitter on Bear Grylls Everest claims: "The permit was NOT to fly over Everest and this did not happen" Two weeks ago, ExWeb ran the story "Pilots say prove it" written by British journalist Tarquin Cooper about Bear Grylls' alleged flight over the summit of Mt Everest. Turned out, it wasn’t a flight over Everest after all. Grylls had announced a change of flight plan before departure, claiming fear of the Chinese airspace, for which he did not have permission. That doesn't correspondent with his expedition website report though. In an email to ExWeb, Bear's outfitter set the record straight, while ExWeb did some calculations.

Report from Peak Lenin climbers: Victims of 1990 avalanche surfacing in melting glacierJuly, 13 1990 a huge avalanche triggered by a small quake caught 43 international climbers in camp at 5300 meters on Peak Lenin. A massive search for victims in one of the worst tragedies in the history of mountain climbing ended up empty. On Wednesday, Kazakh Alexander Chechulin reported his expedition had found a large number of bodies at 4200 meters.

Thuraya new satellite launch to open South East Asia Thuraya has scheduled to shoot up a third satellite on October 15. This will be the first rocket launch from Sea Launch since the accident early this year. The new Thuraya-3 will extend service by the end of 2007 to the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. Eastern Asia as far Japan and South/North Korea will be within the new coverage area as well as all China, Taiwan and a large chunk of Siberia.

ExWeb Circumnavigation special: What is around the world? In Jules Verne’s classic novel “Around the World in 80 days" Phileas Fogg and his friends traveled around the world in this time frame. They won the bet, but it was not “around the world”. Starting out from London; their southernmost point reached was Singapore, still north of the Equator. The word circumnavigate is based in geometry and means to travel around something, like a continent or the earth. The circumnavigation should by definition be around the entire object, or what is called a 'great circle'. The great circle distance on Earth is roughly 40,000 km; marking the minimum distance needed for the label circumnavigation of the earth. Also, two antipodes must be reached.

ExWeb Long Riders' Guild Special Long Riders' Guild reported how alarmed they were by what they had uncovered while researching three Antarctica book classics for a new edition. These guys are adventure horsemen, and looking at Scott's South Pole expedition from this new angle, they discovered serious equestrian mistakes. But what upset the riders most - was the prevailing ignorance about Scott's ponies. One of London's leading equestrian editors was astonished to learn that horses were used in Antarctica, while pedestrian Antarctic historians poked fun at the snow-shoes that Scott and his men left behind at Base Camp - and which could have saved the men - according to the long-riders.

Abora III expedition: Everest extreme skier Tormod Granheim to cross North Atlantic in boat made of reeds Vikings sailed and rowed to Greenland, and probably America, in tiny ships long before Columbus. Thor Heyerdahl showed it possible that Egyptians crossed the Atlantic on a papyrus boat to Central America, teaching the locals how to build pyramids. Now, another Norwegian, well known to ExWeb's climbing community Everest extreme skier Tormod Granheim, is out to prove that intercontinental journeys happened thousands of years before both Columbus and the Vikings. Tormod told ExWeb that after losing his climbing buddy and fellow extreme skier Tomas Olsson on Everest, he needed to do something completely different for a while.

Thomas & Børge update: The last island “On July 14th, Thomas Ulrich and Børge Ousland left their camp in Tichaya Bay and managed to do the first part of the crossing from Hooker to Northbrook Island - Cape Flora, the goal of the expedition of the two adventurers who move on Nansen’s tracks, lies in the South of Northbrook,” Thomas’ home team reported.

Ocean rower Erden Eruc: Working the winds It took him a couple tries to get out there, but once Erden Eruc actually left San Francisco's harbor, the winds seemed they had finally decided to cooperate.

Flanagan setting off for second leg of circumnavigation Tuesday night at 14.30 Alaska time, Adrian Flanagan slipped his moorings from the Port of Nome and set sail for Chukotka, Russia. It is here in the north-eastern settlement town of Provideniya that his yacht Barrabas will be inspected prior to completing his attempt to sail the first ever single-handed vertical circumnavigation of the globe via the Russian Arctic.