Kukuczka was the second man in the world to conquer all the planet’s peaks above 8,000 metres.
Climbing all 14 of the so-called eight-thousanders took him eight years, compared to the 16 years it took Italian climber Reinhold Messner, the first man to perform the feat.
The Polish mountaineer was the only man to have climbed two eight-thousanders in one winter season.
He climbed most of them using virgin routes and, with a partner, established a route on the world's second-highest mountain, K2, so dangerous that nobody has ever attempted to repeat it. The route is known as the “Polish Line.”
Kukuczka fell to his death while attempting to climb the unscaled south face of the Lhotse peak, the fourth highest in the world, on 24 October 1989.
(jh/pk)
Source: PAP