Canadian climber dies in fall on Pakistan’s treacherous K2

ISLAMABAD – A Pakistan official says the Canadian leader of an international mountaineering expedition has fallen to his death on the country’s K2 mountain, often considered the world’s most difficult to climb.

Karrar Haidri, secretary of Alpine Club of Pakistan, said Saturday that mountaineer Serge Dessureault died early Saturday while attempting to scale the 8,611-meter (9,420-yard) mountain in northern Pakistan.

Haidri said it wasn’t immediately clear how Dessureault fell.

Dessureault was leading the nine-member “K2-Broad Peak” expedition up the mountain, which is extremely steep and attracts notoriously bad weather.

Haidri said Dessureault’s body was brought to the mountain’s advance base camp and would be transported to Islamabad.

Last week, Austrian climber Christian Huber was killed at Ultar Sar Peak when his tent was hit by an avalanche.