Muztagh Tower

Muztagh Tower (Mustagh Tower)

Muztagh Tower is a spectacular 7,273-meter (23,861-foot) mountain on the border between Gilgit-Baltistan in Pakistan and Xinjiang in China. Rising in the Baltoro Muztagh of the central Karakoram, it stands between the Baltoro and Sarpo Laggo glacier systems and is one of the most visually distinctive high mountains in Asia.

For decades, Muztagh Tower was regarded as nearly impossible to climb. Much of that reputation came from a famous photograph taken by Italian mountain photographer Vittorio Sella in 1909. From his position southeast of the mountain, Muztagh Tower’s two summit points lined up almost perfectly, transforming the massif into what appeared to be a narrow, impossibly steep fang of rock and ice. The photograph became one of the iconic images of early Karakoram exploration.

Almost half a century later, two elite expeditions arrived simultaneously in 1956, one British and one French. They approached from completely different sides and effectively raced toward the summit without sharing a route.

The British team struck first. Joe Brown and Ian McNaught-Davis reached the slightly lower west summit, followed the next day by John Hartog and Tom Patey, who crossed the difficult connecting terrain to the slightly higher east summit, now regarded as Muztagh Tower’s true main summit. The exact dates are inconsistently reported in early accounts, but the contemporary British chronology places the two summit days on July 6–7, 1956, with the higher east summit reached on the second day.

Only days later, French climbers Guido Magnone, Robert Paragot, André Contamine, and Paul Keller completed an entirely independent route from the southeast and reached the main summit on July 12, 1956. Together, the two expeditions transformed a mountain once portrayed as the ultimate inaccessible tower into one of the defining technical climbing achievements of the 1950s.

Muztagh Tower did not become a frequently climbed mountain afterward. A British expedition finally repeated the northwest side in 1984, Swedish climbers returned successfully in 1990, and modern teams continued to explore its rarely visited faces. In 2008, Slovenians Pavle Kozjek and Dejan Miškovič climbed the northeast face but turned around after reaching the upper ridge; Kozjek was killed during the descent.

Then, in 2012, Russians Dmitry Golovchenko, Alexander Lange, and Sergey Nilov completed the enormous northeast spur by a route they named Think Twice. The 17-day ascent involved 3,400 meters of climbing, difficult rock and mixed terrain, prolonged storms, dwindling food and fuel, and a desperate direct descent of the north side. The climb received a 2013 Piolet d’Or.

Muztagh Tower therefore remains exactly what its earliest photographs suggested: not merely a high mountain, but one of the great technical citadels of the Karakoram.

⚡ Fast Facts

Fact	Details
Alternative Spelling	Mustagh Tower
Continent	Asia
Countries	Pakistan and China
Pakistan Territory	Gilgit-Baltistan
China Region	Xinjiang
Mountain Range	Karakoram
Subrange	Baltoro Muztagh
Modern Mapped Elevation	7,273 m / 23,861 ft
Modern Climbing-Literature Elevation	Often approximately 7,284 m
Prominence	Approximately 1,707 m / 5,600 ft
Isolation	Approximately 6.29 km / 3.91 mi
Key Col	Approximately 5,566 m / 18,261 ft
Nearest Higher Neighbor (NHN)	Skil Brum
Coordinates	Approximately 35.8296° N, 76.3617° E
Peak Classification	Ultra-prominent 7,000-meter mountain
Main Summit	East summit
Lower Summit	West summit
Historical Reputation	“The Last Citadel”
First British Summit Day	July 6–7, 1956
First Main-Summit Ascenders	John Hartog and Tom Patey
British Expedition Members	John Hartog, Tom Patey, Joe Brown, Ian McNaught-Davis
First British Route	Northwest Arête
Independent French Ascent	July 12, 1956
French Summit Team	Guido Magnone, Robert Paragot, André Contamine, Paul Keller
French Route	Southeast Ridge
British Northwest-Ridge Repeat	1984
Swedish Ascent	1990
Northeast-Face Ascent to Ridge	2008
First Complete Northeast-Spur Route	Think Twice, 2012
Think Twice Climbers	Dmitry Golovchenko, Alexander Lange, Sergey Nilov
Piolet d’Or	2013, Think Twice
Protected Area on Pakistan Side	Central Karakoram National Park
Principal Hazards	Avalanches, seracs, cornices, rockfall, crevasses, severe storms, technical mixed climbing, and extreme altitude

🏔️ Where Is Muztagh Tower?

Muztagh Tower rises in the central Karakoram, directly on the frontier between Pakistan and China. Its Pakistani side lies in Gilgit-Baltistan within the vast mountain landscape surrounding the Baltoro Glacier, while its northern and northeastern slopes descend toward Xinjiang.

The mountain stands between two enormous glacial drainage systems. South and southwest lie tributaries leading toward the Baltoro Glacier, the legendary approach corridor for K2, Broad Peak, the Gasherbrums, Masherbrum, and dozens of major Karakoram summits. To the north lies the remote Sarpo Laggo Glacier system.

This location makes Muztagh Tower one of the great frontier mountains of High Asia. The summit itself stands close to the international border, while different routes approach from radically different glacial basins.

From the south, the mountain is encountered after a long journey through the Braldu Valley and Baltoro system. Nearby landmarks include Great Trango Tower, Paiju Peak, Masherbrum, Skil Brum, and the much higher mountains around Concordia.

📏 How High Is Muztagh Tower?

The elevation of Muztagh Tower varies between modern sources.

Peakbagger’s detailed topographic mapping gives the summit as 7,273 meters (23,861 feet). That figure is especially useful because the same dataset provides internally consistent prominence, key-col, and isolation measurements.

Some modern mountaineering sources, including recent American Alpine Journal reports, use approximately 7,284 meters.

Historical sources contain still other values. The British first-ascent expedition generally worked with an elevation around 23,860 feet, remarkably close to the modern 7,273-meter figure.

The differences do not indicate uncertainty over which mountain is being discussed. They reflect the evolution of Karakoram surveying and differences between modern topographic datasets.

For geographical consistency, 7,273 meters is the best working elevation, while 7,284 meters should be recognized as a commonly encountered modern climbing figure.

📐 Prominence and Isolation

Muztagh Tower has approximately 1,707 meters (5,600 feet) of clean topographic prominence.

Its key col lies at approximately 5,566 meters (18,261 feet).

Because its prominence exceeds 1,500 meters, Muztagh Tower qualifies as an ultra-prominent mountain, or Ultra. This distinction is notable because many very high Karakoram summits are connected to larger massifs by saddles too high for them to achieve Ultra status.

Its true topographic isolation is approximately 6.29 kilometers (3.91 miles).

Peakbagger identifies Skil Brum to the east-northeast as the nearest higher mountain.

These statistics confirm what the mountain’s appearance already suggests: Muztagh Tower is not simply a subsidiary bump hidden inside a larger ridge. It rises as a major independent summit.

🧊 What Does Muztagh Mean?

The name Muztagh belongs to a family of Central Asian mountain names derived from Turkic languages.

Muz means ice, while tagh or tag means mountain.

Muztagh can therefore be understood roughly as “Ice Mountain.”

The English word Tower describes the mountain’s extraordinary physical appearance, especially when seen from the famous southern viewpoints where its summit ridge appears compressed into an impossibly narrow spire.

The older spelling Mustagh Tower was extremely common in British and French expedition literature and remains historically important.

Modern geographical and climbing sources more frequently use Muztagh Tower, though both forms refer to the same mountain.

📸 Vittorio Sella’s Famous 1909 Photograph

Few individual photographs have shaped the reputation of a mountain as powerfully as Vittorio Sella’s 1909 image of Muztagh Tower.

Sella accompanied the Duke of the Abruzzi’s Karakoram expedition, which was primarily focused on the exploration of K2 and surrounding peaks.

From the upper Baltoro region, he photographed Muztagh Tower from almost directly southeast.

The camera angle created an extraordinary illusion.

Muztagh Tower has separate eastern and western summit points, but from Sella’s position they aligned almost perfectly. The broad three-dimensional mountain therefore collapsed visually into a narrow, knife-like tower.

The photograph showed walls appearing almost vertical from glacier to summit.

To generations of mountaineers, it looked unclimbable.

🏰 “The Last Citadel”

The mountain’s image became so powerful that it appeared in mountaineering literature as a symbol of the ultimate inaccessible peak.

One widely repeated description referred to Muztagh Tower as “The Last Citadel.”

The name captured the spirit of early 20th-century mountaineering. Everest, K2, Kangchenjunga, Nanga Parbat, and other enormous mountains remained unclimbed, but Muztagh Tower represented a different problem.

Its challenge was not simply altitude.

The mountain appeared to possess no normal slopes at all.

Climbers looking at Sella’s photograph saw something closer to a gigantic rock-and-ice fortress.

By the 1950s, however, climbing techniques had changed dramatically. Strong European alpinists were routinely solving steep rock and mixed routes that would have seemed extraordinary only a generation earlier.

Muztagh Tower’s reputation began attracting rather than repelling them.

🇬🇧 The 1956 British Expedition

The British Baltoro Expedition of 1956 was led by John Hartog.

Its other climbing members were Ian McNaught-Davis, Joe Brown, and Dr. Tom Patey.

It was an exceptionally strong small team.

Joe Brown was among the leading British rock climbers of his generation. Tom Patey was already developing a reputation for bold and inventive climbing in Scotland and the greater ranges. McNaught-Davis was an accomplished mountaineer, while Hartog had dreamed of Muztagh Tower for years.

The expedition chose the northwest arête, approaching from the Muztagh and Chagaran glacier systems on the western side.

Base Camp was established on May 28 at approximately 14,050 feet.

From there, the climbers began building a route through complex glacier terrain toward the high west col.

🧊 Through the Chagaran Glacier

The lower route was far from straightforward.

Camps I and II were established around 15,850 and 17,500 feet.

The Chagaran Glacier was badly crevassed, while lower icefalls required careful route finding between seracs and moraine.

Avalanche and stonefall threatened sections of the approach.

The first major climbing obstacle appeared beneath the west col.

A steep ice wall rose approximately 1,900 feet toward Camp III, which was eventually established around 20,850 feet.

The upper portion of the wall was steep enough that the expedition installed substantial fixed rope.

Once the team reached the col, the real mountain began.

Above rose the northwest ridge.

🧗 The Hardest Section

The section between Camps III and IV became the technical heart of the British route.

To the north lay snow, ice, and hanging glaciers.

To the south plunged steep and in places overhanging rock.

The boundary between these faces formed the only realistic line.

The ridge required demanding mixed climbing with tremendous exposure.

Joe Brown found one of the key solutions when a roughly 100-foot rock cliff blocked the crest. Rather than attack it directly, he traversed onto the south face around a spectacular exposed corner.

More than 1,000 feet of fixed rope eventually protected this section.

Camp IV was established at approximately 21,125 feet.

Above it, the route continued toward the twin summit system.

🏔️ Two Summits

The geography of Muztagh Tower’s highest ridge became extremely important to the first ascent.

The mountain has a west summit and an east summit.

Early measurements suggested that the difference between them was only about 10 feet, but the eastern point was considered slightly higher.

The British climbers initially reached the western top by following the northwest ridge.

Crossing from there toward the eastern summit required descending into a small col and negotiating another significant rock obstacle.

Thus, reaching the first summit point was not necessarily the same as reaching Muztagh Tower’s true highest point.

This distinction created some later confusion over the exact first-ascent date.

🏆 The British First Ascent — July 1956

The British team completed the mountain over two consecutive summit days in early July 1956.

Joe Brown and Ian McNaught-Davis reached the west summit first.

The following day, John Hartog and Tom Patey followed their teammates’ route to the western top and then continued toward the higher eastern summit.

Between the two tops stood a short but difficult rock feature.

Historical accounts describe a Grade V rock step with enormous exposure — approximately 8,000 feet to one side and 6,000 feet to the other.

Hartog and Patey crossed this terrain and reached the east, or main, summit.

Contemporary records place these summit days on July 6 and 7, 1956, though some later summaries compress the whole event into a July 6 first-ascent date.

For precise mountain history, the higher main summit was reached on the second British summit day.

🥶 A Serious Descent

The summit did not mark the end of the British expedition’s difficulties.

Both climbing pairs were forced to bivouac above Camp IV during their descents.

John Hartog suffered significant frostbite to his toes.

This became serious enough that the French expedition doctor later assisted with his evacuation toward Skardu.

The episode illustrates how much more committing Muztagh Tower was than the dramatic summit photographs alone might suggest.

The climb involved days of technical movement, fixed ropes, exposed traverses, mixed terrain, and the possibility of being trapped high on an exceptionally remote mountain.

The British had reached the summit first.

But climbers on the opposite side were still pushing upward.

🇫🇷 A Second Expedition on the Other Side

The French expedition was led by Guido Magnone and included André Contamine, Robert Paragot, Paul Keller, and Dr. François Florence.

The team knew the British were already attempting the mountain.

Rather than interfere with their northwest route, the French deliberately searched for an independent solution.

They established Base Camp near the junction of glacier branches on the southeastern side.

Their first reconnaissance toward the north ridge produced a discouraging conclusion. The route looked impossibly dangerous, threatened by enormous ice avalanches.

Attention shifted to the southeastern side.

There, the climbers identified a complicated possibility through an icefall, beneath seracs, and eventually onto the southeast ridge.

It was hardly easy.

But it was possible.

🧊 Through the Southern Icefall

The French route began with one of the most dangerous approaches on the mountain.

A large icefall barred access to the upper glacier.

Climbers installed cables and even a winching system to move equipment past the steep lower seracs.

Above, a difficult spur led toward Camp III.

By early July, the team had fixed more than 1,000 feet of rope across steep mixed terrain.

Another enormous serac barrier blocked progress above.

The climbers eventually forced a line through its weakest point and established Camp IV at approximately 20,500 feet.

Only then did they see what the British team was doing.

Tiny figures were visible high on the skyline.

Their rivals had reached the summit area.

🤝 A Friendly Race

The 1956 story is often described as a race, and it certainly contained an element of competition.

The British and French both wanted the first ascent of one of the world’s most celebrated unclimbed peaks.

Yet the relationship between the expeditions was considerably more cordial than the word “race” implies.

Magnone visited the British camp during the expedition, and the teams discussed their intentions directly.

They agreed not to interfere with one another’s routes.

The approaches were completely different anyway.

After both teams succeeded, the rivalry largely disappeared.

The French later helped the British deal with Hartog’s frostbite, and the two expeditions celebrated their accomplishments together at Urdukas.

The result was one of the more appealing stories of simultaneous success in the history of Karakoram mountaineering.

🧗 The Southeast Ridge

The French had still not solved the mountain.

After gaining the ridge above Camp IV, they discovered a sequence of deep gaps and steep towers.

Progress was painfully slow.

On one critical section, it took around six hours of sustained effort to climb an almost vertical iced wall and gain a notch.

The ridge above contained exposed icy slopes, unstable cornices, and multiple rock towers.

The climbers fixed virtually every available rope as they worked upward.

By July 11, they had reached roughly 23,000 feet but could no longer continue before dark.

They prepared for an exposed bivouac.

The following morning, they resumed climbing in deteriorating weather.

🏆 The French Summit — July 12, 1956

On July 12, the French team climbed through deep and dangerously unstable snow toward Muztagh Tower’s highest point.

Progress was exhausting.

At times the leader sank almost to the waist and had to excavate a trench through the snow.

Near the top, André Contamine and Robert Paragot explored rock while Paul Keller and Guido Magnone continued directly upward through the snow.

At approximately 1 p.m., the four climbers reached the summit.

The top was narrow and unstable enough that they could barely remain there.

Snow was already beginning to fall.

They descended immediately, using numerous rappels before eventually reaching Camp IV in darkness.

The French had completed the second ascent of the main summit by a completely independent route only days after the British first ascent.

🌍 Eight Climbers, Two Routes

The 1956 season remains extraordinary because eight climbers reached Muztagh Tower from two different sides during the same brief period.

The British northwest route and French southeast route had little in common except the summit.

The event dramatically changed perceptions of the mountain.

Vittorio Sella’s photograph had suggested a single impossibly thin rock tower.

The climbers discovered a much more complicated three-dimensional mountain containing glaciers, ridges, hidden snow slopes, subsidiary summits, and routes invisible from the classic viewpoint.

The lesson was significant for mountaineering more broadly.

A photograph can make a mountain look impossible from one direction while concealing entirely different possibilities behind it.

Muztagh Tower had not been easy.

But it had never been the one-dimensional fortress that Sella’s famous image seemed to show.

⏳ Nearly Three Decades of Silence

Given the drama of 1956, one might expect Muztagh Tower to have become a popular objective.

The opposite happened.

For nearly three decades, no expedition completed another confirmed ascent.

Part of the reason was simple: both established routes were difficult and remote.

The long approach through the Baltoro required major logistics, while climbers interested in the region had an enormous range of alternative objectives.

Nearby K2, Broad Peak, Gasherbrum, the Trango Towers, Masherbrum, and numerous unclimbed peaks competed for attention.

Muztagh Tower’s reputation remained formidable.

Then, in 1984, a British expedition returned to the original northwest route.

🇬🇧 The 1984 British Expedition

The 1984 expedition was led by Mal Duff and included Tony Brindle, Jon Tinker, Sandy Allan, Alex Reid, and American participants.

The team followed essentially the northwest route pioneered in 1956.

Base Camp was established on July 1.

Camps I and II were placed around 16,800 and 18,700 feet, while Camp III eventually reached roughly 20,600 feet.

The lower glacier and icefall proved more complicated than expected.

Once on the ridge, the climbers encountered interesting mixed terrain and used two bivouacs during their summit pushes.

Duff and Brindle reached the summit area on July 29, followed by Allan and Tinker on July 30.

A later historical correction clarified an important detail: the 1984 climbers reached the lower west summit, rather than the higher eastern main summit.

🧭 Why Summit Precision Matters

Muztagh Tower is a useful example of why summit claims on complex mountains require careful geographical interpretation.

The western and eastern tops are extremely close in elevation.

To an exhausted climber arriving via the northwest ridge, the west summit is a natural endpoint.

But the historical first ascent established that the east summit is slightly higher.

This distinction led to later corrections in published mountaineering records.

The same issue appears on other famous mountains with complicated summit ridges, including Manaslu, Annapurna, Lhotse Middle, and several Karakoram peaks.

Modern GPS equipment has made identifying precise summit locations easier, but very high ridges still present real practical problems.

A difference of only a few meters can require significant additional climbing.

🇸🇪 The 1990 Swedish Expedition

Muztagh Tower was climbed again in 1990 by a Swedish expedition.

Among the successful climbers were Göran Kropp and Rafael Jensen.

The team approached through the Chagaran Glacier region and used a variation of the British northwest route.

Several camps and substantial fixed rope were established.

The approach remained long and difficult, but the Swedes found a shortcut through a major lower couloir that they considered somewhat less demanding and less exposed to avalanches than the original British solution.

For Göran Kropp, then only in his early twenties, the ascent became an important step toward an extraordinary mountaineering career.

He later became internationally famous for cycling from Sweden to Nepal and climbing Everest without supplemental oxygen.

Muztagh Tower helped prove that he could function successfully on serious high-altitude technical terrain.

🧭 The Mountain Remains Rarely Climbed

Even after the 1984 and 1990 ascents, Muztagh Tower remained an exceptionally quiet mountain.

A 2012 American Alpine Journal report observed that only five expeditions had climbed one or both of the twin summits up to that point: the British and French expeditions of 1956, the British party in 1984, the Swedish team in 1990, and the Russians in 2012.

This is extraordinary for a mountain first climbed more than half a century earlier.

Its remoteness is only part of the explanation.

Muztagh Tower’s faces and ridges are objectively dangerous, its established routes are long, weather can be severe, and relatively little modern route infrastructure exists.

Climbers cannot assume that previous fixed ropes, tracks, camps, or local route knowledge will be waiting for them.

Every expedition retains a strong exploratory element.

🧊 The Northeast Side

For decades, the northeast face and northeast spur remained among the most intriguing unsolved features on the mountain.

The side is rarely seen by ordinary Baltoro trekkers because it faces toward the Younghusband and northern glacier systems.

Reconnaissance in the early 2000s revealed an intimidating landscape.

The true north face and north ridge were threatened by huge active seracs.

The southeast ridge carried enormous cornices.

Two possibilities appeared somewhat more realistic: a predominantly snow-and-ice route toward the southeast ridge and a much more direct line up the poorly defined northeast spur.

Both would prove serious.

🇸🇮 Pavle Kozjek and Dejan Miškovič — 2008

Slovenian climbers Pavle Kozjek and Dejan Miškovič arrived in 2008 to attempt the northeastern side.

They selected a line consisting of snowfields, rock bands, steep ice, and sustained mixed climbing.

The route began around 2:30 a.m. on August 24.

The first major rock band involved climbing around WI5 and M5, while higher icefields reached approximately 55–75 degrees.

Above, thin ice and steep rock produced sustained mixed climbing.

The final 150 meters toward the ridge consisted of extremely steep snow approaching 80 degrees.

After approximately 17 hours of climbing, the pair gained the high ridge at roughly 6,800–6,900 meters.

The summit remained some distance away.

🌬️ Turning Back

Kozjek and Miškovič dug a snow cave on the ridge and spent the night.

The following morning brought powerful wind.

Instead of continuing toward Muztagh Tower’s summit, Kozjek suggested descending along the southeast ridge toward the old French route.

It was the sensible decision.

They had already completed an important ascent of the northeast face, and continuing into severe weather along a corniced ridge would have increased the danger considerably.

The two began descending.

Soon afterward, tragedy struck.

Pavle Kozjek fell to his death.

Miškovič survived and completed the descent alone.

The accident became a painful reminder that on mountains such as Muztagh Tower, reaching a ridge or summit may represent only half the challenge.

🕯️ Pavle Kozjek

Pavle Kozjek was one of Slovenia’s leading alpinists.

His climbing career included difficult routes throughout the Alps, Andes, Himalayas, and Karakoram.

In 1997, he climbed Everest from Tibet without supplemental oxygen. In 2006, he completed a rapid solo route on the southwest face of Cho Oyu.

He was particularly respected for bold, lightweight technical climbing.

His death on Muztagh Tower in 2008 was therefore deeply felt within the international climbing community.

The line he and Miškovič climbed also provided valuable knowledge of the mountain’s northeastern architecture.

Four years later, another team would return and attempt an even more direct solution.

🇷🇺 The 2012 Russian Expedition

The 2012 Russian team consisted of Dmitry Golovchenko, Alexander Lange, and Sergey Nilov, supported by expedition organizer Sergey Kotachkov.

They chose the northeast spur, a roughly 2,000-meter feature descending from close to the main summit.

The team spent time studying surrounding terrain and acclimatizing before committing to the wall.

They also inspected possible descent routes from Moni La, Muztagh Tower’s key-col area.

The original plan involved climbing the northeast spur and then descending the northwest ridge.

Reality proved considerably more complicated.

On August 9, the three climbers crossed the bergschrund and began the route.

They expected to spend around two weeks on the mountain.

🌨️ A Week of Snow

Conditions changed almost immediately.

The first day was hot, with wet snow and heavy packs making movement exhausting.

Then clouds arrived.

Snow began falling and continued for roughly a week.

The climbers moved slowly upward to around 6,200 meters and spent periods waiting in their tent.

This strategy was one of the unusual characteristics of the ascent.

Rather than carrying the extremely minimal supplies typical of pure alpine style, the Russians brought enough food and fuel to survive a prolonged single push.

Their approach has sometimes been described as semi-alpine style.

The added weight slowed them down but also allowed them to remain committed to the mountain when the weather collapsed.

🧗 The Upper Headwall

When the weather finally improved, the climbers moved toward the major technical barrier.

Wind had plastered extraordinary snow and ice formations onto near-vertical rock.

The direct line looked almost impossible.

They therefore began a long rising traverse toward the north-northeast ridge.

Sergey Nilov led approximately 600 meters of technical climbing, with free-climbing difficulties reaching roughly 6a–6b and one pitch of A2 aid.

The terrain was serious and highly exposed.

By August 23, the climbers had virtually run out of food.

Only a few sweets remained.

The following morning, their gas was also exhausted.

Yet the summit was still above them.

🏆 Think Twice — August 25, 2012

The climbers continued upward in increasingly severe conditions.

Strong wind forced them to spend another night inside a crevasse only a few hundred meters from the summit.

On the morning of August 25, they resumed climbing.

At approximately 7 a.m., Dmitry Golovchenko, Alexander Lange, and Sergey Nilov reached Muztagh Tower’s east, or main, summit.

They had been on the route for 17 days.

The new climb was named Think Twice.

The route involved approximately 3,400 meters of climbing and was graded roughly ED, 6a, A2, M6.

It was the first complete ascent of the northeast spur and one of the most demanding new routes climbed anywhere in the Karakoram that year.

But the descent nearly became a disaster.

⚠️ Twenty-Three Hours Down

The Russians intended to move across the upper mountain and descend the established British northwest route.

Bad weather and poor visibility prevented them from locating the planned line.

Instead, they found themselves blocked by an icefall.

Climbing back upward would have cost time and energy they no longer possessed.

They decided to rappel directly down the north face and north ridge system.

The descent was extremely dangerous.

Avalanches and spindrift swept past them, visibility remained poor, and their headlamps eventually failed.

They continued moving through the night.

Approximately 23 hours after leaving the summit, the three climbers finally reached the Younghusband Glacier.

They had survived one of the most committing ascents in Muztagh Tower’s history.

🏅 Piolet d’Or 2013

Think Twice was selected for the 2013 Piolets d’Or, the influential international awards recognizing outstanding alpinism.

That year’s jury made the unusual decision to recognize all six nominated climbs.

Golovchenko, Lange, and Nilov therefore received a Piolet d’Or for Muztagh Tower.

The award reflected several qualities of the ascent: technical difficulty, high altitude, commitment, originality, prolonged exposure, minimal fixed infrastructure, and the improvisation required during the descent.

The climbers themselves described Think Twice as among the hardest experiences of their mountaineering careers.

The route also renewed international interest in a mountain that had gone decades with very few successful expeditions.

🧭 The Northwest Ridge

The northwest ridge remains the mountain’s historically established route from the Pakistani side.

It was pioneered by Hartog, Brown, Patey, and McNaught-Davis in 1956 and repeated by later teams.

The route involves much more than simply following a snow ridge.

Climbers must negotiate crevassed glaciers, steep ice, exposed mixed sections, rock barriers, cornices, and the summit traverse between the western and eastern tops if attempting the actual main summit.

The approach itself is substantial.

Modern climbers should not expect the route to resemble a maintained Himalayan commercial line.

There are no permanent fixed ropes, stocked camps, or large seasonal guiding operations.

Conditions change dramatically between expeditions.

🧭 The Southeast Ridge

The southeast ridge, climbed by the French in 1956, remains even more remarkable because it appears to have received almost no complete repeats.

Later expeditions have repeatedly investigated or attempted portions of the line.

The lower approach crosses complicated icefall terrain before reaching snowfields beneath a prominent rocky feature known as the Black Tooth.

Above lie steep snow, mixed terrain, cornices, towers, and the long upper ridge to the main summit.

A 2005 expedition made repeated attempts but was stopped around 6,300 meters by avalanche danger and poor weather.

Other climbers have subsequently attempted more integral versions of the southeast ridge.

Its rarity demonstrates just how difficult the supposedly “second route” of 1956 actually was.

🦷 The Black Tooth

The Black Tooth is a prominent subsidiary summit or tower along the long southeast-ridge system.

Modern climbing reports place it around 6,700 meters, with figures such as 6,702 and 6,719 meters appearing in different sources.

The French 1956 route bypassed portions of this lower ridge system rather than climbing every tower directly.

Later climbers became interested in completing a fully integral version of the southeast ridge.

In 2019, climbers established the first recognized ascent of the Black Tooth itself, demonstrating that substantial unclimbed features remained around Muztagh Tower more than six decades after the main summit was first reached.

The tower is another reminder that Muztagh Tower is really a complicated massif rather than a single narrow spire.

Caravan of porters and climbers on Baltoro Glacier, Muztagh Tower visible in the background

🧊 Glaciers Around Muztagh Tower

Muztagh Tower stands within an extraordinary network of glaciers.

On the southwestern side, the Muztagh and Chagaran glaciers played central roles in the original British approach.

The southeastern side drains toward the Biange and Younghusband glacier systems, used by the French expedition and later northeast-side teams.

Farther north, glaciers descend toward the remote Sarpo Laggo basin.

These glaciers are not merely approach corridors.

They create many of the mountain’s principal hazards.

Crevasses, seracs, icefalls, avalanche debris, unstable snow bridges, and rapidly changing glacier surfaces have affected almost every expedition.

The geography also means that climbers approaching from different sides may experience what feels like a completely different mountain.

🌦️ Climate and Weather

Muztagh Tower lies in the central Karakoram, where reliable weather windows can be remarkably short.

The range is generally drier than the central Himalayas, but summer storms can still produce prolonged snowfall at altitude.

The 1956 French expedition spent roughly ten consecutive days trapped by snow early in its climb.

The British first ascenders reported poor weather on approximately half of the expedition days.

The 2012 Russians were caught by a week-long snowstorm almost immediately after committing to their route.

Strong wind creates additional problems along the narrow upper ridges.

Cornices build on lee sides, snow is plastered onto steep rock, and apparently stable slopes can develop dangerous wind slabs.

For technical teams occupying a high face for many days, weather becomes as important as climbing difficulty.

⚠️ Avalanches and Seracs

Avalanche danger affects virtually every side of Muztagh Tower.

The British northwest route passes beneath hanging snow and ice terrain.

The French southeast approach required movement through icefalls and beneath a huge serac barrier.

Modern reconnaissance has shown that the true north face and parts of the north ridge are threatened by enormous active seracs.

Snow avalanches can also become severe after storms.

The problem is particularly serious because climbers may have little choice about where to move. Narrow gullies and glacier basins naturally funnel snow and ice into limited corridors.

Several expeditions have timed movement for night or early morning to reduce exposure to warming slopes.

Even then, serac collapse can occur without warning.

🪨 Rock and Mixed Climbing

Muztagh Tower’s early reputation focused on rock walls, but successful climbing usually requires a mixture of disciplines.

The British first ascent combined rock, ice, snow, and exposed ridge climbing.

The French route involved icy slabs, rock towers, deep snow, and difficult ridges.

The northeast spur added modern mixed climbing and aid.

This diversity is one reason the mountain remains demanding.

A strong pure rock climber may struggle with glacial hazards and altitude, while a high-altitude snow climber may find the technical rock sections intimidating.

Successful teams generally need broad alpine competence rather than specialization in a single style.

That requirement separates Muztagh Tower from many higher peaks whose normal routes are dominated primarily by snow and glacier travel.

🫁 Extreme Altitude

At more than 7,270 meters, Muztagh Tower lies below the conventional 8,000-meter death zone but remains an extreme high-altitude environment.

Atmospheric oxygen pressure is dramatically reduced.

Climbers move more slowly, recover poorly, eat less, sleep badly, and become increasingly vulnerable to cold and exhaustion.

Technical climbing magnifies these problems.

A Grade V rock step that might be straightforward in the Alps becomes a very different proposition after days of climbing at more than 7,000 meters.

Fine motor control deteriorates, judgment can become slower, and hauling equipment becomes exhausting.

Muztagh Tower therefore combines big-wall and technical-alpine difficulty with the physiological demands of a major Himalayan-scale summit.

🏞️ Central Karakoram National Park

The Pakistani side of Muztagh Tower lies within the wider protected landscape of Central Karakoram National Park.

The park was established in 1993 and covers more than 10,500 square kilometers, making it Pakistan’s largest national park.

It includes many of the central Karakoram’s greatest mountains and glacier systems, among them K2, Broad Peak, the Gasherbrums, the Baltoro Glacier, Biafo Glacier, and numerous major 7,000-meter peaks.

Glaciers cover approximately 38 percent of the park.

Muztagh Tower occupies the northeastern reaches of the famous Baltoro mountaineering landscape, near the frontier with China.

The upper mountain itself is essentially lifeless rock, snow, and ice, but the protected area extends thousands of meters lower into ecosystems supporting plants, wildlife, and human communities.

🌿 Flora and Fauna

Virtually no ordinary vegetation survives on Muztagh Tower’s high climbing routes.

The upper massif consists of bare rock, glacier ice, permanent snow, and highly unstable alpine terrain.

At lower elevations within Central Karakoram National Park, vegetation becomes considerably more diverse.

The park recognizes alpine dry steppe, alpine meadow, alpine scrub, and subalpine scrub zones.

Characteristic plants include West Himalayan spruce, Himalayan white pine, juniper, wormwood, thyme, clover, and numerous hardy alpine herbs.

Vegetation remains sparse compared with wetter Himalayan regions because much of the central Karakoram is extremely dry.

The contrast is dramatic: green pockets and pasture exist in valleys far below summits where almost no biological life is possible.

🐾 Wildlife

Central Karakoram National Park protects some of Pakistan’s most important high-altitude wildlife habitat.

Snow leopards inhabit remote rocky landscapes, while Himalayan ibex occur on steep alpine slopes.

Other recorded mammals include markhor, musk deer, Himalayan lynx, wolf, Tibetan red fox, stone marten, alpine weasel, and Kashmir marmot.

The protected landscape also supports approximately 90 bird species, including Himalayan snowcock, snow partridge, chukar, golden eagle, Himalayan griffon, and bearded vulture.

Most wildlife lives thousands of meters below Muztagh Tower’s summit.

The glaciers surrounding the mountain nevertheless feed the river systems and alpine environments upon which lower ecosystems depend.

🌊 Baltoro and Sarpo Laggo

Muztagh Tower occupies a major geographical divide between the Baltoro and Sarpo Laggo basins.

The southern watershed eventually contributes meltwater to the Baltoro Glacier and Braldu river system, which ultimately drains into the Indus.

The northern side belongs to a completely different internal drainage system associated with Xinjiang and the Tarim Basin.

Muztagh Tower therefore lies near a continental-scale hydrological divide.

Snow falling only a short distance apart on opposite sides of the mountain may ultimately travel toward completely different drainage basins.

This frontier geography contributes to the mountain’s exceptional remoteness and explains why approaches from Pakistan and China involve entirely separate logistical worlds.

🪨 Geology

Muztagh Tower belongs to the immensely complex geological landscape created by the collision between the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates.

The Karakoram contains intrusive, metamorphic, and sedimentary rock units that have been compressed, faulted, uplifted, and exposed through millions of years of erosion.

Glaciers then carved deeply into this rapidly rising terrain.

The result around Muztagh Tower is a landscape of steep walls, sharp ridges, hanging glaciers, and isolated rock towers.

Freeze-thaw weathering continues breaking exposed rock apart, while glacier movement and avalanches constantly reshape the lower slopes.

Although the mountain is famous for its apparently solid architecture, climbers still encounter sections of loose and unreliable rock.

The mountain continues changing far more rapidly than its fortress-like appearance suggests.

🥾 Seeing Muztagh Tower Without Climbing It

Muztagh Tower can be seen from portions of the Baltoro trekking corridor, though it is not as constantly visible as the Trango Towers or Masherbrum.

Trekkers following the approach toward K2 travel from Askole through the Braldu Valley to Paiju Peak before continuing onto the Baltoro Glacier.

Farther east, views open toward the complex northern mountain systems containing Muztagh Tower, Skil Brum, and other high frontier peaks.

The classic perspective that made Muztagh Tower famous requires a particular angle.

From other directions, the mountain looks broader and far more complicated than Sella’s celebrated 1909 photograph suggests.

This makes seeing it from multiple locations especially interesting.

The apparently impossible needle turns back into an enormous, complex mountain massif.

🏔️ Nearby Mountains

Skil Brum rises east-northeast of Muztagh Tower and is its nearest higher neighbor in modern topographic mapping.

Skyang Kangri lies farther east near K2 and reaches approximately 7,544 meters.

K2 rises farther southeast to more than 8,600 meters and dominates the upper Baltoro–Godwin-Austen region.

Broad Peak stands south of K2 and exceeds 8,000 meters.

Masherbrum dominates the southern side of the Baltoro at more than 7,800 meters.

Farther west, Great Trango Tower and the Trango Towers form another legendary collection of technical climbing objectives.

Paiju Peak rises near the lower entrance to the Baltoro Glacier.

Few 7,000-meter mountains have such extraordinary neighbors.

🧭 Can Muztagh Tower Be Climbed Today?

Yes, but Muztagh Tower is an expedition-level technical mountain and its border location adds regulatory complexity.

Because the summit exceeds 6,500 meters, a foreign expedition approaching from Pakistan falls within the country’s mountaineering-permit system.

Current Pakistan Tourism Development Corporation guidance requires climbers attempting peaks of 6,500 meters or higher to use the mountaineering visa category and coordinate the permit process through a licensed Pakistani tour operator.

Gilgit-Baltistan’s Tourism Department has also reiterated that expeditions must obtain official climbing permits and provide the required insurance documentation before beginning.

The summit lies on the Pakistan–China frontier, so attempts involving the Chinese side would require separate authorization from Chinese authorities.

Regulations can change, particularly around sensitive border areas, so a modern expedition must verify current requirements before committing to a route.

🧭 Is There a Normal Route?

The northwest ridge can reasonably be regarded as Muztagh Tower’s traditional or normal route because it produced the original British ascent and later repeats.

That description should not be confused with the type of normal route found on heavily climbed commercial mountains.

There are no permanent seasonal camps or maintained fixed ropes.

The glacier approach changes.

Icefalls move.

Snow conditions vary.

Cornices alter shape.

Previous anchors may no longer exist or be trustworthy.

The route also naturally reaches the lower west summit before climbers make the additional traverse toward the higher east summit.

A modern team therefore still needs full expedition and technical alpine capability.

Muztagh Tower has a known route, not an easy route.

⭐ Why Muztagh Tower Is Remarkable

Muztagh Tower is remarkable because it changed the way generations of climbers imagined what a mountain could look like.

Vittorio Sella’s photograph transformed it into the ultimate vertical fortress. From one perfect angle, its separate summit ridges disappeared behind one another and the mountain became a single impossible tooth rising above the Karakoram glaciers.

For almost fifty years, that photograph defined Muztagh Tower.

Then two teams arrived in 1956.

The British attacked from the northwest, forcing a route through crevassed glacier, steep ice, mixed ridges, spectacular rock traverses, and the exposed connection between the twin summits.

The French came from the opposite side, winching supplies through an icefall, climbing beneath huge seracs, fighting vertical iced slabs and rock towers, and finally wading through dangerously deep snow toward the summit.

They could see one another only near the end.

Both succeeded.

Rather than diminishing Muztagh Tower’s reputation, the twin ascents made it even more legendary. The mountain had proven climbable, but only through routes worthy of its appearance.

Then it became quiet.

Decades passed between successful expeditions. Even the 1984 British repeat reached only the lower west summit. The original French line remained almost untouched.

Modern climbers began looking at the still-unclimbed walls. Pavle Kozjek and Dejan Miškovič climbed the northeast face in 2008, only for Kozjek to die on descent.

Four years later, Golovchenko, Lange, and Nilov committed themselves to the center of the northeastern side. For 17 days they lived on the mountain through storms, difficult mixed climbing, disappearing food supplies, and a final summit push with no remaining gas.

They reached the east summit and then discovered they could not safely reach their planned descent.

Their 23-hour escape directly down the north side became almost as significant as the ascent.

Think Twice earned a Piolet d’Or and confirmed that Muztagh Tower remained capable of generating world-class climbing more than half a century after its first ascent.

Today, thousands of climbers and trekkers travel into the central Karakoram every year.

Very few climb Muztagh Tower.

That rarity is part of its character.

It is high enough to impose severe altitude, prominent enough to stand as an independent mountain, technical enough to challenge elite climbers, and remote enough that every expedition retains an element of exploration.

More than a century after Sella made it famous, the Last Citadel remains one of the defining mountains of technical Karakoram alpinism.

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

How high is Muztagh Tower?

Modern Peakbagger mapping gives Muztagh Tower an elevation of 7,273 meters (23,861 feet). Some recent climbing sources use approximately 7,284 meters.

Where is Muztagh Tower?

It lies on the border between Gilgit-Baltistan in Pakistan and Xinjiang in China in the Baltoro Muztagh of the Karakoram.

Is Muztagh Tower also called Mustagh Tower?

Yes. Mustagh Tower is the traditional English spelling found throughout older British and French climbing literature.

What does Muztagh mean?

The name comes from Turkic words broadly meaning “ice mountain.”

Why was Muztagh Tower once considered unclimbable?

A famous 1909 photograph by Vittorio Sella aligned the mountain’s twin summits and made it appear to be an impossibly narrow vertical tower. The image strongly shaped its early reputation.

What was Muztagh Tower’s nickname?

It became associated with the phrase “The Last Citadel,” reflecting its reputation as one of the great supposedly inaccessible mountains.

How prominent is Muztagh Tower?

Muztagh Tower has approximately 1,707 meters (5,600 feet) of clean topographic prominence.

Is Muztagh Tower an ultra-prominent mountain?

Yes. Its prominence exceeds the 1,500-meter threshold required for Ultra status.

How isolated is Muztagh Tower?

Its topographic isolation is approximately 6.29 kilometers (3.91 miles).

What is Muztagh Tower’s nearest higher neighbor?

Peakbagger identifies Skil Brum as the nearest higher mountain.

Does Muztagh Tower have two summits?

Yes. It has a slightly lower west summit and a slightly higher east summit. The eastern point is regarded as the true main summit.

Who first climbed Muztagh Tower?

The British expedition consisted of John Hartog, Tom Patey, Joe Brown, and Ian McNaught-Davis.

Who reached the west summit first?

Joe Brown and Ian McNaught-Davis reached the west summit during the first British summit day.

Who first reached the true main summit?

John Hartog and Tom Patey continued to the slightly higher east summit during the following summit day.

When was Muztagh Tower first climbed?

The British completed their ascent over July 6–7, 1956, with the higher east summit reached on the second day. Some summaries simply list July 6 as the mountain’s first-ascent date.

What route did the British use?

They climbed the northwest arête, approaching through the Muztagh and Chagaran glacier systems.

Did another expedition climb Muztagh Tower in 1956?

Yes. A French expedition climbed an independent route from the southeast only days later.

Who made the French ascent?

Guido Magnone, Robert Paragot, André Contamine, and Paul Keller reached the main summit on July 12, 1956.

Did the British and French teams compete?

There was friendly competition to make the first ascent, but the teams climbed completely independent routes and maintained cordial relations. The French later helped with John Hartog’s frostbite treatment.

When was the northwest route repeated?

A British expedition led by Mal Duff repeated the route in 1984, although later clarification indicated that its climbers reached the lower west summit.

Did Göran Kropp climb Muztagh Tower?

Yes. Kropp and Rafael Jensen climbed the mountain during a Swedish expedition in 1990.

What happened on Muztagh Tower in 2008?

Pavle Kozjek and Dejan Miškovič climbed the northeast face and reached the upper ridge but decided not to continue toward the summit because of strong wind. Kozjek was killed in a fall during the descent.

What is Think Twice?

Think Twice is the major new northeast-spur route established by Dmitry Golovchenko, Alexander Lange, and Sergey Nilov in 2012.

How long did Think Twice take?

The Russians spent approximately 17 days on the ascent.

How difficult was Think Twice?

The route involved approximately 3,400 meters of climbing and was graded around ED, 6a, A2, M6.

Did the Think Twice climbers reach the true summit?

Yes. They reached Muztagh Tower’s higher east summit on August 25, 2012.

Did Think Twice receive a Piolet d’Or?

Yes. The ascent received a 2013 Piolet d’Or.

Is the French southeast route frequently repeated?

No. The 1956 French route remains exceptionally rarely climbed and appears never to have received a straightforward complete repeat in the manner expected of a normal route.

Can Muztagh Tower be climbed today?

Yes, subject to current expedition permits, insurance, tour-operator requirements, protected-area regulations, and border restrictions.

Is Muztagh Tower a commercial expedition mountain?

No. It remains a rarely climbed technical objective requiring advanced glacier, rock, ice, mixed, altitude, and expedition skills.

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