The Himalayas are a great mountain range formed
by the collision of Indo-Pakistan tectonic plate
with the Asian
Continent.The central Himalayan mountains are
situated in Nepal, while the eastern mountains
extend to the borders of Bhutan and Sikkim.
Nanga Parbat massif is the western corner pillar
of the Himalayas. It is an isolated range of
peaks just springing up from nothing, and is
surrounded by the rivers Indus and Astore. Nanga
Parbat or "Nanga Parvata" means the naked
mountain. Its original and appropriate name,
however, is Diamir the king of mountains.
Nanga Parbat (main peak) has a height of
8,126m/26,660 ft. It has three vast faces. The
Rakhiot (Ra Kot) face
is dominated by the north and south silver crags
and silver plateau; the Diamir face is rocky in
the beginning. It converts itself into ice
fields around Nanga Parbat peak. The Rupal face
is the highest precipice in the world. Reinhold
Messner, a living legend in mountaineering from
Italy, says that "every one who has ever stood
at the foot of this face (4,500m/14,764ft) up
above the 'Tap Alpe', studied it or flown over
it, could not help the amazement of its sheer
size; it has become known as the highest rock
and ice wall in the world!". Nanga Parbat has
always been associated with tragedies and
tribulations until it was climbed in 1953. A lot
of mountaineers have perished on Nanga Parbat
since 1895. Even today it is claiming a heavy
toll of human lives, mountaineers in search of
adventure and thrill, and in finding new and
absolutely un-climbed routes are becoming its
victims.
It was in 1841 that a huge rock-slide from the
Nanga Parbat dammed the Indus river. This
created a huge lake,
55 km long,like the present Tarbela lake
down-stream. The flood water that was released
when the dam broke caused a rise of 80 ft in the
river's 3 level at Attock and swept away an
entire Sikh army. It was also in the middle of
the nineteenth century that similar catastrophes
were later caused by the damming of Hunza and
Shyok rivers.
The Nanga Parbat peak was discovered in the
nineteenth century by Europeans. The
Schlagintweit brothers, who hailed from Munich
(Germany) came in 1854 to Himalayas and drew a
panoramic view which is the first known picture
of Nanga Parbat. In 1857 one of them was
murdered in Kashgar. The curse of Nanga Parbat
had begun!
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