Apa Sherpa

Nepalese mountain climber

Apa (born Lhakpa Tenzing Sherpa; 20 January 1960), He first summited Everest in 1990 and his last time to the summit was in 2011.

Lhakpa Tenzing Sherpa was born in Thame, a village in the Everest region of Nepal, near the Chinese border. Following his father's death when he was 12 years old, Apa had to take up the responsibilities of his family, consisting of his mother, two sisters and three young brothers. He dropped out of school and earned money working as a porter for mountaineering groups. His climbing career began in 1985, and he worked as a kitchen boy and porter for various groups but was not given the opportunity to reach the summit until 1990.

Apa married Yangjin, then also a resident of Thame, in 1988 and has two sons—Tenjing and Pemba—and a daughter Dawa. A fourth child died in 2004. In December, 2006, the family moved to the United States with the help of his friend Jerry Mika to provide their children a better education and for business opportunities. They live in Draper, Utah. In April 2009, Apa founded the Apa Sherpa Foundation, dedicated to the improvement of education and economic development in Nepal. Although he worked as a guide for years, he wants young people to have other career options. "The Sherpas do all the hard work and they were the only ones taken in this tragedy," he said in 2014 after 16 Sherpas died in an avalanche on 18 April. (In 2015, 10 Sherpas died at the Everest Base Camp after the avalanches in the wake of the April 2015 Nepal earthquake. In total, 118 Sherpas have died on Everest between 1921 and 2018.) "They are doing this [mountain guiding and portering] because they have no other choice to make money. With an education they have a choice. Our goal is to give the younger generation a chance to go to school so they don't have to climb." He then began his career as Sirdar, or chief Sherpa, for many high altitude expeditions. Except for 1996 and 2001, he reached the summit every year between 1990 and 2011; all but three times have been in May. In 1992 he reached the summit twice. Apa in his May 2010 Trek says that climbing to Everest has become tough due to the melting of ice and rock surfaces. He sees visible changes on the Everest summit due to global warming.

After climbing Everest 21 times, he retired in 2011 and eventually moved to the Salt Lake City area of Utah but frequently travels to Nepal. In 2009, he co founded The Apa Sherpa Foundation, a group striving to provide better education and an improved economy in Nepal.

In April 2012, he successfully led the first expedition to complete the Great Himalaya Trail, a 1,700 kilometre (1,050 mile) trek spanning the entire length of the Nepalese Himalayas. The Great Himalaya Trail is considered to be one of the world's most difficult treks. Sherpa and three companions set off in January on the Climate Smart Celebrity Trek, an expedition promoting tourism and highlighting the effects of climate change. The adventurers set out from the shadow of the world's third highest peak, Mount Kanchenjunga, in the east and finished at Nepal's border with Tibet in the west, 20 days ahead of schedule. Along the way they traversed some of the world's most rugged landscapes, ascending beyond 6,000 metres (19,600 feet). Dawa Steven Sherpa, a member of the expedition who has climbed Everest twice, said the group found mountain communities that rely on subsistence farming were suffering the effects of climate change.