From Gurkha to record-breaking mountaineer: The time I spent with Nims Purja
Nirmal Purja and nine other climbers were caught in an avalanche in Pakistan last Thursday, ending the life of the former Gurkha and SBS operative who was one of the world's foremost mountaineers.
Mr Purja, more commonly known as Nimsdai or simply Nims, came to international attention when he became the first person to climb all 14 of the world's mountains with a peak above 8,000 metres in 189 days.
This smashed the previous record for accomplishing the feat by more than seven years.
The complete package
I met the 43-year-old just before he set off for his record attempt at his Hampshire home. From there we set off together for Lulworth Cove, on the Dorset coast. Apparently, the perfect training spot for attempting to climb massive mountains!
After I'd filmed him training, struggling to keep up all the time, Nims told me how his time in the Armed Forces, especially training and values, had helped shape his life.
"You know, I was born in Nepal and was the best of the Gurkhas and also trained by one of the best units in the United Kingdom," he told me.
"So I'm the full composition of everything, I guess. Training, the values and everything put me into a lot better position."
Nims was referring to his time in the Special Forces. He became the first Gurkha to join the Special Boat Service when he transferred to the SBS from the Brigade of Gurkhas in 2009.
He left the military 10 years later to focus on mountaineering.
Project Possible and a life saved
Nims began his challenge to climb those 14 mountains, entitled Project Possible, on 23 April 2019 and steadily worked his way through the list, completing them all on 29 October the same year.
This was a truly outstanding feat which propelled him to world attention.
During his descent of Mount Annapurna, during his Guinness World Record-breaking series of ascents, he helped rescue an injured climber.
A rescue helicopter managed to spot the stricken climber. However, at an altitude of 26,545ft this was too high for it to land.
Quick action was needed to save the climber's life, so Nims volunteered to tie himself under the helicopter to get to the casualty.
Nims explained: "Because the altitude is too great, we had to do a long-line rescue – literally hanging underneath the helicopter... dropped close to the site.
"We still had a long climb past Camp Four, the last base before the summit, and we realised that we had to work quickly."
Thanks to Nims' quick actions leading the rescue team of four, they managed to move the 49-year-old injured doctor down from the summit to Base Camp Three – where the helicopter was now able to land.
Not the first
It wasn't the first time during a world record climb that Nims had been involved in a rescue.
Nims told us: "In 2016 I was executing a solo attempt on Everest when I came across a fellow climber who had been passed by other climbers.
"Being a Gurkha and a former member of the Special Forces, we never leave any man behind.
"I used everything I could to bring her below the 'death zone' for a rescue. I have never been that tired before."
MBE one day, K2 the next
More records tumbled and more firsts were achieved over the next few years.
Nims, along with nine other Nepali mountaineers, made history on 16 January 2021 as the first to climb K2, the second-highest mountain on Earth, in the harsh weather conditions of the winter.
He was awarded an MBE in 2022 at Windsor Castle. The very next day he caught a 6am flight to climb K2 once again.
In late October 2024, Nims reached the summit of Carstensz Pyramid in New Guinea – the final peak to complete his Seven Summits Challenge, where climbers summit the highest peaks across all seven continents.
The feat made him the only person to have conquered the Seven Summits plus the 14 highest peaks in the world, both with and without supplemental oxygen.
Summiting Carstensz Pyramid – also known as Puncak Jaya – marked the end of a record-breaking month.
On 4 October 2024, he became the fastest person to climb all 14 of the peaks without any supplementary oxygen. It took him two years, four months and 28 days.
On the same day he became the fastest – and only – person to achieve the 14 peaks feat both with and without oxygen, the feat having taken him five years, five months and 12 days.
And on 9 October he became the only person to have reached 48 8,000m summits.
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