World first: Andrzej Bargiel just skied down Everest without bottled oxygen
The Polish athlete becomes the first person to climb to and ski from Mount Everest's summit without supplementary oxygen - cementing his place among the legends of high-mountain endurance.
Andrzej Bargiel, the 37-year-old ski mountaineer from Poland known for his incredible climb-and-ski feats, has just done something no one else on Earth has ever managed before: he climbed Mount Everest without using bottled oxygen – and then skied all the way back down to the end of snow after the Khumbu Icefall.
On September 22, after nearly 16 hours climbing in Everest’s notorious “death zone” (above 8,000m where oxygen levels are dangerously low), Bargiel clipped into his skis right on the summit and started his descent via the South Col Route. He reached Camp II that night and rested - the summit push had taken longer than planned, meaning darkness made it dangerous and difficult to navigate further that day. The next morning, he skied through the treacherous Khumbu Icefall - guided in part by a drone flown by his brother, Bartek - before safely arriving at Base Camp to become the first person to ascend and descend Mount Everest with no bottled oxygen.
Bargiel descended on skis without supplementary oxygen
Discussing that epic, 16-hour climb to the summit, Bargiel said: "The ascent was difficult because other expeditions are closed at this time of year. Much more work is required [and] the conditions are much more difficult… It would have been most convenient for me to go straight from Base Camp to the summit, but conditions don't always allow for that. In this case, that's exactly what happened. It's incredibly high. You have to be well prepared to be able to function for 16 hours above 8,000m.
This wasn’t just another extreme feat. More than 6,000 people have climbed Everest, but fewer than 200 have ever done it without supplementary oxygen. Skiing back down again afterwards, however, is a huge, individual achievement – and is something that'd never been done before.
Describing his descent, Bargiel explained: "I split the descent into two parts, as navigating the technically difficult Icefall in relatively safe conditions was only possible in the morning. The summit itself was arduous and difficult. I'd never spent so much time at such an altitude in my life, so that was a challenge in itself."
Picking a path back through Khumbu Icefall on the descent
Why is it so impressive? At the top of Everest - the cruising height of a passenger jet - the air is so thin that climbers only get about a third of the oxygen available at sea level. Staying up there for too long can cause brain damage, fluid in the lungs, or even death. Bargiel spent almost 16 hours in those conditions and still managed a controlled ski descent.
Bargiel, who has succeeded on his third attempt at Everest, after previous expeditions in 2019 and 2022, concluded: “It’s one of the most important milestones in my sports career. Skiing down Everest without oxygen was a dream that had been growing inside me for years. I knew that the difficult autumn conditions and plotting the descent line through the Khumbu Glacier would be the greatest challenge I could ever face.”
Looking for a way through Khumbu Icefall during the ascent
Bargiel already had a reputation for doing the impossible. Back in 2018 he became the first (and still only) person to ski down K2, the world’s second-highest mountain. With Everest now conquered, he’s the only mountaineer in history to ski from both Everest and K2, as well as all the 8,000m peaks of the Karakoram range – and all without supplementary oxygen.
His achievement is being hailed as a breakthrough in human endurance, mountaineering, and extreme skiing. It’s the kind of “world first” that proves just how far determination, training, and resilience can push the limits of what humans are capable of.
