Avalanche on Manaslu Kills Climber and Sherpa Guide at Camp 3

An Indian-German climber and his Nepali Sherpa guide were killed when an avalanche struck their tent at Camp 3 on Mount Manaslu, the world's eighth-highest peak, expedition organisers said.

Dhruva Jyoti Guha, a resident of Germany, and Fursemba Sherpa, an experienced mountain guide from Nepal's Makalu region, had moved up from Camp 2 towards a higher camp despite adverse weather. They were caught in the avalanche on Saturday night, according to Mohan Lamsal, managing director of Makalu Adventure, which organised the expedition.

A rescue team reached Camp 3 after the pair stopped communicating with organisers; their last contact was on Saturday night. The bodies were found buried under roughly seven feet of snow.

"A heavy avalanche fell above their tent and both the climbers were buried in the snow," Lamsal said.

Six other climbers from the same company chose to retreat from Camp 2 because of the conditions and were safe. Lamsal said the two who pressed on in a hurry despite the bad weather met with the accident.

Efforts were under way to bring the bodies down to base camp, from where they were expected to be flown to Kathmandu on Monday if the weather allowed.

The deaths take the number of fatalities on Manaslu this climbing season to four. A Singaporean climber and a Nepali guide had died earlier in separate incidents on the mountain, the organiser said.

Manaslu rises 8,163 metres (26,781 feet) above sea level in Nepal's Gorkha district, in the Himalayas about 65 km east of the Annapurna range. Its name comes from a Sanskrit word meaning "mountain of the spirit."