Climber Accused of Stepping Over Dying Man on Way to Record

The Norwegian mountain climber who just set a record by climbing the 14 highest peaks in the world in just 92 days is under scrutiny after footage emerged that appears to show her team members climbing over a dying sherpa as they ascend toward the summit of K2. The climber, Kristin Harila, pushes back against allegations of callousness, saying her team did all it could to help the porter, 37-year-old Mohammed Hassan. Hassan fell from an edge at nearly 27,000 feet up the mountain, the Guardian reports.

"Given the conditions, it is hard to see how he could have been saved. He fell on what is probably the most dangerous part of the mountain where the chances of carrying someone off were limited by the narrow trail and poor snow conditions," and he was not wearing gloves or a down jacket when her team found him, Harila says. "It is simply not true to say that we did nothing to help him. We tried to lift him back up for an hour and a half and my cameraman stayed on for another hour to look after him. At no point was he left alone." The sherpa did not survive. The Guardian has video of the incident here. (More Sherpas stories.)