Experienced climber raising funds for cancer-stricken kids dies scaling mountain

Metro

05-05-2025

An experienced mountaineer has died on a Himalayan mountain while trying to raise funds for a children's cancer charity.
Father-of-two Alexander Pancoe, 39, from the US state of Illinois, fell unresponsive shortly before going to bed on Sunday at Camp II on Nepal's Mount Makalu, the fifth-tallest mountain in the world.
Mr Pancoe, who had survived a brain tumour and was still battling leukemia, had returned that day from a practice climb.
Starting at Camp II, which is around 6,700 metres above sea level, it involves reaching Camp III (roughtly 7,350 metres above sea level) to acclimatise to the the conditions before climbing back down.
He set out to reach the peak having thus far raised $27,838 (a dollar for each foot of the peak's altitude) for Lurie Children's Hospital in Chicago.
His brain tumour was removed by surgeons at the hospital 20 years ago, and it now has a renowned pediatric blood cancer programme.
The 39-year-old found out he had developed blood cancer after becoming 'extremely hypoxic and struggled with the altitude' while climbing another mountain in the Himalayas in 2023.
'Several months later I was diagnosed with Chronic Myeloid Leukemia and learned my body had been unable to make the red bloods cells necessary to acclimate at altitude,' he said in a statement before the Makalu climb.
'CML is a lifelong cancer and after almost two years of receiving treatment to manage it – I am going to be attempting to climb Makalu.
'It's going to be a huge challenge for me – climbing at altitude is plenty hard without a chronic ailment – but I look forward to rising to the challenge.
Pancoe was with his team of four when he began feeling unwell while preparing to rest for the night. More Trending
The team tried to revive him for more than an hour but their efforts were in vain.
Expedition organiser Iswari Paudel told The Independent that he and his team 'suspect that it was a cardiac arrest' that killed Mr Pancoe.
In 2019 he completed the Explorer's Grand Slam, which involves summiting the tallest mountain on each of the world's seven traditional continents, and reaching both the North and South poles.
He is one of only 75 people in the world ever to have achieved the feat, raising $500,000 in the process.
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