Manaslu is living up to its grim reputation. The world's eighth-highest mountain, in Nepal's Himalaya, has claimed two more lives just as more than 1,000 climbers and support staff crowd the route during a short, storm-disrupted autumn window.
The victims were Indian-German climber Dhruba Jyoti Guha and his guide Phursemba Sherpa, found buried under about two metres of snow after a slab avalanche hit their Camp 3 tent. The pair had pushed higher than the rest of their Makalu Adventure team, hoping for an early summit chance before the weather turned. When they stopped answering the radio, a Sherpa rescue team went up and found them. A drone flight later revealed a fractured snow slab on the slope above.
The backdrop is a shrinking window and a looming cyclone in the Bay of Bengal, expected to reach the Nepalese mountains between Wednesday and Friday. Rope fixers topped out last Friday, drawing crowds upward, but weekend storms forced most teams back to Base Camp. Now everyone faces the same three choices: wait weeks for safer conditions, go home, or rush a summit push through tired legs, unstable snow and crowded fixed ropes.
Veteran Italian climber Simone Moro, on his seventh Manaslu expedition, turned back from Camp 3 on Saturday and didn't hold back online, saying the 400 people at Base Camp must choose between proving safety matters or gambling on what he called a Russian-roulette climb. Reinhold Messner publicly backed him, writing that no summit is worth a life, guide or paying client alike. Guide Mingma G — who led the recovery after July's Broad Peak avalanche that killed 10 climbers — urged everyone to watch forecasts and asked Nepal's government to ensure emergency arrangements are in place.
Teams are splitting. The Russian outfit led by Artem Tsentevitski and Elite Exped are waiting it out. American guide Luke Smithwick called off his ski expedition entirely, having survived cyclones in Nepal in 2014, 2019, 2021 and 2025. But others are climbing: 14 Peaks Expeditions, Summit Force, Seven Summit Treks and the huge 8K Expeditions team are all moving up, with summit pushes targeted for 23-24 September. The 7 Summits Club's 17 clients and 17 Sherpas are also heading up on oxygen. American climber Justin Sackett, on the mountain after a no-oxygen Everest attempt last spring, summed up the mood: go carefully, turn around if snow looks unstable, it's not worth dying for.
Why does this matter to travellers? Manaslu has become a popular, slightly cheaper alternative to Everest and is also the anchor of the beautiful Manaslu Circuit trek, which passes through the same valleys. But the mountain's avalanche-prone slopes between Camps 3 and 4 — where skier Hilaree Nelson died in 2022 — show how quickly conditions shift. Anyone trekking the region this autumn should expect closures, rescue traffic and travel disruption as the cyclone arrives, and should build weather buffer days into any Manaslu itinerary. For armchair followers, the next few days will show whether the crowds choose patience or the summit.
