NEW DELHI: For the first time in the history of Indian Air Force, a group of female officers have embarked on a mission to scale Mount Everest, the tallest peak in the world.
The 20-member IAF team was flagged off by Air Marshal JN Burma today. The team consists of 11 women officers who will be accompanied by one doctor and eight male officers who are qualified mountaineers, the Indian Defence Ministry said in a press release today.
As part of the preparation for the ambitious expedition, the team underwent a rigorous training schedule, including basic mountaineering course and winter training camps at Siachen in 2010 and 2011.
The team went on to scale progressively higher and tougher Himalayan peaks in the past two years starting with Mt Stok Kangri (6121M) in Leh, Mt Bhagirathi II (6512M) in Uttarkhand, Mt Kamet (7757M) in Garhwal and Mt Saser Kangri I (7672M) in Ladakh. The IAF conceived the idea in early 2009 and prepared the team for the expedition since then. The team will be following the southeast ridge route, which was used by the first conquerors of Mt Everest, Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay.The route includes technical challenges like the famous Khumbu icefall, which is extremely volatile and keeps shifting, and innumerable crevasses.
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