K2, the world's most dangerous mountain, sat quiet this year, hiding its gnashing teeth while a record number of climbers descended and successfully summited the second-highest peak on Earth.
An American climber fears this "inflection point" in mountaineering, where for the first time large commercial expeditions swarmed K2 like they have on Everest in recent decades, is a ticking time bomb.
Alan Arnette said nobody should be lulled into a false sense of security despite an extraordinary season of scenes and feats on the 8611-metre peak known as the "Savage Mountain".
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K2 is just one bad weather event away from "a massive, massive disaster" that could cause between 20-30 deaths in a 24-hour period, Arnette told 9news.com.au.
Crowds of climbers who have paid $90,000, with many operating beyond their technical skill level, would be dangerously exposed in such an event, he said.
Prior to this season, which was blessed with perfect climbing weather, around one person died on the mountain for every four climbers who reached the top. Sydney man Matthew Eakin was one of three known deaths on K2 this year. It's believed he fell while descending from Camp 1.
Though final numbers are yet to be confirmed, it's estimated close to 200 people may have summited in 2022, obliterating the previous record of 62, set in 2018.
So demanding is K2 that, since it was first ascended in 1954, there have been 32 years where not a single climber has reached the top. In the same period, Everest has not been summited in just nine years.
Incredibly, on July 22 this year, 145 people summitted in a single day. Video recorded by a Sherpa on that day showed a line of climbers waiting at a bottleneck, which was reminiscent of a 2019 photo on a packed Everest which went viral.
"I think it was a very lucky season for many people on K2," Arnette said, speaking from his home base in Colorado.
"They got very fortunate with the weather."
Arnette said he has spoken with numerous climbers who described many near-misses involving rockfall due to the sheer number of people on the mountain this year.
"It was just off the charts," he said.
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So what has suddenly changed, why the remarkable shift?
K2 is still a savage mountain, Arnette said, but "2022 was the year the Everest model came to K2".
In 2016, after two consecutive years of not a single soul summiting K2, Arnette wrote on his popular mountaineering blog that K2 would never get like Everest, which every year kept drawing bigger crowds.
Among some in the climbing community, there was a general – if simplistic and harsh – feeling that if you had enough money an expert team of Sherpas would get you to the top of Everest.
But K2 was different, or at least it was meant to be.
Arnette thought K2 would never "become Everest" because of its notorious technical difficulty, avalanche risk and "the death rate scares people off".
"I was wrong," Arnette said.
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To find out why, it's necessary to backtrack to 2019, when Pakistan relaxed many of its once-tight visa restrictions.
As well as opening up the country to more international visitors, this led to an influx of highly experienced Sherpa-led climbing operations from nearby Nepal to run expeditions in Pakistan's north.
The arrival of those Sherpa teams, with world-renowned climbing abilities, fundamentally changed the ratio of support climbers to paying clients on K2, Arnette said.
A single climber on K2 was now being supported, on average, by two Sherpas and often a plentiful supply of oxygen, he said.
Arnette said one team on the mountain this year had 23 Sherpas who were helping 13 climbers.
"Another team had two paying clients, two Western guides and 13 Sherpas."
Climbers were also now using tanked oxygen from lower altitudes on the mountain than previous years, Arnette said, which allowed them to climb and operate much more efficiently in rarefied air.
Another significant change to the traditional K2 experience was the skipping of a week-long trek to reach base camp, courtesy of Pakistan military helicopters carrying climbers who were splitting the $29,000 cost to whip in and out.
"Pakistan joined the mountain greed club this year," Arnette semi-joked, declaring that the north of Pakistan, the glorious gateway to the Karakoram mountain range, will become a version of Nepal.
"They've tasted the sweet permit fee flavour, and they're not going to go away from it," he said.
Disheartening though it may be for alpine purists, Arnette cautioned mountaineers in the West from being "too judgmental" about the inevitable sweeping changes.
"Every single country monetises its natural resources," he said, pointing to the rampant commercialisation of Denali in the US, Mont Blanc and the Matterhorn in Europe and Kosciuszko in Australia.
"In Nepal, tourism is a natural resource and a national resource.
"And Pakistan is figuring out they've got the same thing in the northern territories."
That said, authorities in Pakistan will need to manage the environmental impact that comes with opening their arms to bigger crowds carrying their flush wallets.
This year climbers on K2 reported growing and problematic piles of rubbish and human waste, and tents being pitched on top of discarded gear, used food packaging and fuel cans.
Yet, tucked in among many of this season's gloomy headlines, Arnette said there were triumphant, less-heralded feats on K2 to be celebrated.
Danish climber Andreas Ritzau Frydensberg and American Eric Gilbertson summited K2 using no supplemental oxygen, no Sherpa support and without the aid of a commercial expedition team.
"That's the reason people go climb these mountains," Arnette said.
"There's a phenomenal personal sense of satisfaction if you allow yourself to connect to nature and enjoy the experience, and you come home a better version of yourself."
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