Legendary Lake District mountaineer Doug Scott, the first Briton to climb Everest by the south west face, has died aged 79.
Mr Scott was diagnosed with an inoperable brain cancer earlier this year.
When he was diagnosed , his family said he was comfortable at his home in Caldbeck and was taking medication to alleviate the symptoms.
His climbing achievements are legendary, having made notable ascents of Changabang, Kangchenjunga, Nuptse and Shishapangma.
Mr Scott famously climbed down The Ogre in Pakistan — after becoming the first person to summit the 7,285 metre high mountain — with two broken legs.
On 40 expeditions to the high mountains of Asia he made 30 first ascents.
After the siege tactics on the great mountains in the 1970s, Mr Scott was a leading advocate of the lightweight Alpine-style expeditions which followed.
In 2011, he was awarded one of mountaineering’s highest honours, the Piolet D’Or Lifetime Achievement Award.
Mr Scott set up the charity Community Action Nepal (CAN) in 1997 to improve the standard of living in remote Himalayan communities and give something back to the mountain people who had helped him to achieve his mountaineering goals.
He and other mountaineers identified the need to improve the economic working practices of expedition porters, and this led them to realise that the communities they came from also faced major social problems – such as lack of health and education provision, and clean water – which needed to be tackled.
Over the years CAN has supported more than 50 schools, health posts, porter rescue shelters and other community development projects.
In the earthquake that struck Nepal in 2015 the majority of communities CAN supported were devastated, but Doug went immediately into action. He was up at 3am every day liaising with CAN staff in Nepal, co-ordinating emergency relief and planning post-crisis recovery.
With CAN trustees, he spearheaded an earthquake fundraising campaign which raised £2.5 million to rebuild earthquake resistant schools and health posts in line with ‘Building Back Better’ principles.
For the last 25 years his passion for and commitment to the mountain people of Nepal remained a constant.
At the point when Mr Scott began to feel unwell in March this year his major concern was that CAN nurses and the communities they serve in North Gorkha had access to the medicines, equipment and PPE they would need in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.
He was also worried about possible food shortages. He was greatly relieved when the CAN team in Nepal reported that CAN staff had everything in place to help protect these remote mountain communities.
