Obituaries

Achille Compagnoni, a mountaineer who was one of the first two men to reach the summit of the deadly K2, has died at the ripe old age of 94.

He and climbing partner Lino Lacedelli reached the summit of the legendary deadly mountain in 1954:

Mr. Compagnoni and his fellow climber Lino Lacedelli were part of an Italian team that conquered the mountain on July 31, 1954. K2 is in the border region of northern Pakistan and China. The expedition, of more than a dozen members, had been organized by the explorer and geologist Ardito Desio, who died in 2001.

It “was one of the last acts of heroic mountaineering,” Reinhold Messner, a renowned Italian mountain climber, told the news agency ANSA this week. “Compagnoni,” Mr. Messner added, “was a physically strong climber, with a lot of heart and big lungs.”

Lacedelli is still alive. He is 83 years old.
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Basketball great Wayman Tisdale, only 44, of cancer.

He suffered from the same cancer, osteosarcoma, as Canadian runner/hero Terry Fox (1958-1981).
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