Qomolangma: The reel challenge

Stills from the documentary Captain Qomolangma show how Sula Wangping, 39, from Aba Tibetan and Qiang autonomous prefecture in Sichuan province, guided a team of eight climbers and six cameramen to the summit of Qomolangma in 2019. CHINA DAILY

Behind the scenes

Sula Wangping describes himself as "a man of many dreams". As a climber, he pushed boundaries－he not only scaled Qomolangma, but also led a team to document the ascent and descent for posterity.

He began his pet project in 2014, when he handpicked 10 mountain guides and turned them into lensmen. It was impossible to find a professional film crew to go the whole hog and he decided that the guides would do his documentary more justice. They learned how to handle cameras from scratch and went on to master the skill of filming with drones.

Every year after that, Sula Wangping studied the brief window of summit days－usually lasting a week after May 15－when the temperatures are a tad warmer, the weather is stable and there is no wind.

In April 2019, the team of 15 embarked on the incredible Qomolangma journey from the Southeast Ridge via Nepal. "My eight climbers and six lensmen were just ordinary people who grew up with me. They had followed me to mountains at 5,000 to 6,000 meters, then 7,000 meters and finally, 8,848 meters," Sula Wangping says.

Shooting was undoubtedly the toughest part of the arduous climb. "Every cameraman carried equipment weighing about 40 kilograms while a climber usually carried about 10 kg," he recalls.

To protect cameras and drones from freezing, they kept the equipment wrapped close to the body during the day and inside sleeping bags at night. To guarantee that the drones functioned without interruption at high altitude, more than 30 batteries were packed.

On May 15, the team reached the summit, the first to do so in 2019.Eleven people reportedly died on Qomolangma that year, making it the deadliest since 2015.

Sula Wangping strongly contests using the expression "conquering "when referring to summiting a mountain. In his eyes, mountaineering is a process in which people must expect to be accepted by nature. He always led his team to traditional Tibetan blessing ceremonies before setting foot on the mountains.

He clearly knows the dangers of expeditions, which are sometimes fatal. Despite being "a dream chaser", he never forgets his own motto: "Set off only when you know the score".

Sula Wangping's next dream, according to the ambitious man himself, is to complete the Explorers Grand Slam, a challenge to scale the highest peaks in seven continents, and reach the North Pole and the South Pole.

Contact the writers at wangqian@chinadaily.com.cn