Changemaker Speaker Series Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner: Defying Limits: Climbing the 14 Highest Peaks

Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner’s interest in mountain climbing developed at a very young age. It was Reverend Dr. Erich Tischler, a youth group leader in her hometown of Spital am Pyhrn, Upper Austria, who introduced her to the fascinating world of mountains. After the dominical church service, he would take Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner along on numerous tours to the mountains surrounding her hometown.

For her first career, Gerlinde worked as a nurse, giving her unique insight into the human body and a better understanding of how to keep it at peak performance. She skied and climbed mountains in her spare time, occasionally leading tours.  She always dreamed of climbing one of the world’s tallest mountains, known as the 8,000-meter peaks.  She achieved that dream at the age of 23, when she reached the summit of Broad Peak in Pakistan (8,027m).  That lit a fire inside of her.

During the following years, she poured all of her extra money from her nursing career into trekking and climbing expeditions to the Himalaya. She would climb four more peaks on her vacations from work.  After summitting the 5th 8,000-meter peak, Nanga Parbat (8,126m), in Pakistan, she decided to go for her dream to become a professional mountain climber.

Today, Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner has climbed all fourteen main peaks in the eight thousand series as well as two fore summits higher than eight thousand meters. By reaching the summit of K2 (8,611m), the second highest—and considered by many to be the most dangerous—peak in the world, she became the first woman to scale all 8,000m peaks without the use of supplementary oxygen or the help of high-altitude porters.

Presented in association with Aspen Center for Environmental Studies