K2 West Face, Aug 19. All team climbers are heading for K2's top! Figuring out what to do next sure didn't take these guys long: A weather window has opened it seems, but there are still hard wind gusts above 7000 m. Pavel Shabalin, Andrew Mariev, Iljas Tukhvatullin and Vadim Popovich have made a trail to the horizontal rock band and will spend the night in C6! Behind - three teams of three climbers each are positioned between C4 and C5!

Denis and Sergey on K2 North Face approach "Sergey has sworn not to cut his hair, shave or wash until after summit," Denis reported. The two are now approaching K2's desolate north face on camels.

Hello from the other side of K2 – Kazakh's camp 4 on the NW ridge With all the action on the west and south flanks of K2, the world almost forgot about the Kazakh's and Russian Serguey Bogomolov, inching their way up the peak’s unfinished NW ridge. Last week, as they reached almost 8000 meters, ExWeb did a big special on the team along with some of their lofty pictures from the route.

K2 blizzard says 'go home': It's over for Dodo and the Peters They hoped for a weather window but a blizzard finally sent home also Piotr Morawski, Dodo Kopold and Peter Hamor. Dodo is returning with a remarkable score on his first Himalayan 8000ers experience: He has bagged three big summits this year – Cho Oyu, Shisha Pangma and Nanga Parbat.

AdventureStats Special: The unclimbed faces of K2 With the normal routes now deserted, only the off route climbers are left. The East Face, the North Face and the West Face still await a first ascent, while the NW ridge needs a completion - and for the first time in many years, mountaineers once again attempt such impossible missions. This rare mountaineering drama offered reason at last for AdventureStats to be updated with cool information on the peak's unclimbed faces and sharp ridges, compiled on a 3D map. Check the special story on the current action.

Alert to senior climbers: Beware of dangerous Everest study A dangerous Everest age study hit global news last week, with conclusions countering other such studies in the past. The reason perhaps that the results (unchecked by media) were based on 2 (!) climbers, out of 10,000 attempts. ExWeb ran a quick special on the danger of small samples in statistical evaluation, and also published the stats for 4 age groups on Everest - showing that seniors should keep climbing!

BaseCampMD: Those over 60 had half the incidence of AMS In addition to an examination of the cases mentioned by the study, ExWeb checked in with the seasoned Everest physician Luanne Freer (BaseCampMD). "Age does have an influence on incidence of altitude, with those over 50 years old somewhat less vulnerable," she said.

ExWeb Special - Fruit flies vs. climbers: A Guide to a Perfect Life When we published Noah's (15) story, some 'grown-ups' mused at his enthusiasm, thinking that he'll get his reality check soon enough. As for the record breaking Everest climber Miura (74), a fruit flies expert determined he shouldn't have been on Everest. "People, who have lost their dreams, will try to shoot down yours. Guard that door fiercely," ExWeb wrote in an Age Special - which also included some basic math.

Ricardo Valencia and Santiago Sagaste Tribute expedition - friends' attempt to recover remains from Dhaula Spaniards Ricardo and Santiago were lost on Dhaulagiri three months ago - hit by an avalanche while sleeping in C2. Now Ricardo’s friends hope to retrieve their bodies, in an expedition led by a climber who was there only days before disaster struck: Iñaki Ochoa de Olza. Nepal’s Government has been supportive of the mission; granting the expedition to go without a climbing permit.

The Krasnoyarsk Trango - Broad Peak expedition launched a summit bid on Broad last week, but aborted at 7800m due to avalanche risk and called the expedition off. They had previously opened two new routes on the Trango Towers.

GII: Tougher than expected Jean, Fred, Olivier and Mike encountered deep snow, and climbed around the eastern side of the summit [pyramid]. This put an extra 7-10 hours onto the team's climbing time. They topped-out around midday, on August 12th, and were the only team to summit GII from its normal route this year. The team is now moving to Broad Peak, sans Olivier who's going home. “It is not sure if time will allow us to do the K2 as well. This will depend on the weather,” Mike reported.

Broad Peak: Hungarian summits After summiting GI, the Hungarian team was expected in K2’s BC - but never showed up. The climbers went instead for Broad Peak and summited last Saturday. Broad Peak became Zsolt Eross 6th 8000er.

Spantik summits FTA reports that 5 of their climbers were on top yesterday and 6 more were going for it last night.

North Cape-ho! Borge and Thomas at sea - picked up from Cape Flora Monday After 20 days in Cape Flora, Borge Ousland and Tomas Ulrich were picked up Monday by the 'Athene', and headed toward Norway on a sailing ship just like Nansen 112 years back. They're expected to arrive Norway's North Cape by August 20th.

ExpeditionNews about Lewis Gordon Pugh's not so first North Pole swim The bones in Pugh’s coverage were that he had done the first swim at the North Pole. "10 years ago it would have been impossible for all the ice there," he said in an US TV broadcast, referring to Global warming. However, open water at the North Pole in the summer season is not new, and stretches back more than 10 years. There have also been quite a few dips at and around the spot over the years, so ExpeditionNews dove into the claims. Among those disputing the erroneous 'first swim' claim is the director of The Explorers Club, who did it in 1996, along with Edmund Ball, 92, and wife Avery - who did it three years later - in just a bikini.

Exploration claims: There! It's mine! Explorers are not alone to make lavish claims; their nations are just as good at it and LA Times published some examples. Closing the recent Russian mini-sub North Pole flag "incident" John Spear commented on "The Lede" page in New York Times, “In 1926 Commander Richard E. Byrd dropped a US flag near the north pole from an airplane flown by Floyd Bennett." The Arctic explorer Artur Chilingarov, 67, who descended 14,000 feet below the NP ice cap in a deep sea submersible said his main concern was to resurface at the ice hole they dived through.

Aussie young guns preparing for a 2008 encore of Victoria Island unfinished business Last time, Aussies Clark Carter and Chris Bray were 20 and 21 years old, attempting an unsupported 1000km trek E/W across the ninth largest island in the world. Fast forward two years, and the kids are at it again: Out to finish the two thirds of distance they left undone! Older and wiser, this time they'll be armed with a number of improvements to their unique gear - this including bullet proof wheels!

Jason Lewis rows across the Bosphorous - last leg is on! Jason is back in Europe. Last week he set foot on European soil after rowing across Turkey's Bosphorous, the legendary strip of water dividing Europe from Asia, and the city of Istanbul in two halves. For the crossing, Jason used a Turkish 'kayik' courtesy of Erden Eruc whose family also checked on Jason through this leg, "to make sure I'm not lying face down in a ditch somewhere." The16th and final leg will go 3,000 kms across Europe - the plan is to reach Oostende in Belgium by the 23rd September, allowing at least a week to prepare Moksha for the final crossing of the Channel and passage up the River Thames.

Adrian Flanagan update: Search for ghost islands in a sea of ice Adrian Flanagan and his boat Barrabas did Dimitriya Lapteva Strait, but due to ice in the area of the Vil’kitskogo Strait, it is not possible to pass through. Looking for anchorages is not easy either. Winds, shallow water, strong currents, and a busted engine all have limited Adrian’s progress. Now, he tries to figure out where to go, hoping for a window around 25th August.

It's that time of year again! Mars Society 10th convention kicks off Aug 30 at UCLA Last year in Washington DC, Mars Society founder Robert Zubrin said that once he'd asked a great American inventor what the most essential quality is for a NASA engineer. "Courage," he had replied. If you want to go to Mars like we do, then the Mars Society yearly event is the place to be. Expect a packed, hands-on event. The 10th convention will be held 30 Aug - 2 Sep 2007 at the University of California, Los Angeles.