KATHMANDU: In 2012, US Marine Corps sergeant Kirstie Ennis, survived a helicopter crash in Afghanistan. She suffered severe injuries, lost one of her legs, but never looked back.
Now, she aims to conquer the top of the world, Mt. Everest, with her left leg amputated above the knee to become the first female amputee to scale the 8,848 meters summit.
After a period of acclimatization, Kirstie will gradually ascend the mountain with her team. She believes her unwavering determination and enthusiasm will take her to the top of the world.
Kirstie has been posting incredible pictures from the Everest Base Camp (EBC) on social media platforms over the last few days.
Kirstie hopes to raise money and awareness for her Kirstie Foundation, which has a slogan of “Making a Million Dollars To Give A Million Dollars Away” and targets ‘education, opportunity, and healing in the outdoors’.
Kirstie has been posting incredible pictures from the Everest Base Camp (EBC) on social media platforms over the last few days.
On Instagram, she said: “Yes, of course – my tent is the massive gold space station of a dome. I need all the leg room. Seriously.”
Before embarking on her journey to the Everest, she wrote on her Instagram: “I’ve sorted my gear for the Puja this afternoon. I’ve been blessed more times since being in Nepal than I ever have in my life. I pulled out my summit suit, boots, technical gear, crampon foot, and the other essentials for God willing, a summit. I’m excited for the ceremony as it’s something I’ve only seen on television.”
Her story, in fact, begins in the Marines, which she said the job she was destined for from an early age. Her parents were both Marines whom she idolized.
Now, she is on a mission to set a world record and hopes to inspire other people to use their potential.
In fact, she has already summited the 16,100-feet Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and the 16,000-ft Puncak Jaya in Indonesia to become the first female amputee to scale these peaks, reports said.
Her posting on Instagram says: “When does it become enough? It’s an addiction, maybe more like an obsession. It’s an insatiable hunger for more — more suffering, more altitude, more effort, more views, with fewer boundaries. I’ve been asked why a thousand times. Until you lose yourself in the magnitude of these mountain ranges and find yourself all over again — only then will you realize we’ve been doing it wrong all along. There’s a sort of clarity and vibrancy here. You can’t control everything in life. You don’t have the final say, especially in the mountains. Your problems don’t matter out here — Hell, you don’t matter. It’s the most freeing and humbling feeling. It’s the feeling of living with your heart, not your head.”
In fact, back in 2015, Kirstie met Prince Harry on a 1,600-kilometer walk around Britain, when the Prince gave her a hug. It was the same year she started climbing mountains.
This time, she is accompanied by a team, including her climbing partner Christopher Pollock, also a videographer.
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