Alison Jane Hargreaves (17 February 1962 – 13 August 1995) was a British mountaineer. Her accomplishments included scaling Mount Everest alone, without supplementary oxygen or support from a Sherpa team, in 1995. She soloed all the great north faces of the Alps in a single season—a first for any climber. This feat included climbing the difficult north face of the Eiger in the Alps. Hargreaves also climbed 6,812-metre (22,349 ft) Ama Dablam in Nepal.
In 1995, Hargreaves intended to climb the three highest mountains in the world—Mount Everest, K2, and Kangchenjunga—unaided. On 13 May 1995, she became the first woman to reach summit of Everest without the aid of Sherpas or bottled oxygen; on 13 August, she died while descending from the summit of K2.
Personal life
Hargreaves grew up in Belper, Derbyshire, and attended Belper High School. After leaving home at 18, she lived with and later married Jim Ballard, and in 1995 the family moved to Spean Bridge, in the Scottish Highlands, closer to conditions suitable for her training.
She was six months pregnant with her first child, Tom, when she climbed the Eiger north face. Tom Ballard went on to become the first person to solo climb all of the six great north faces of the Alps in a single winter. He died in 2019 while descending Nanga Parbat.
The great north faces of the Alps
In 1993, Hargreaves decided to solo climb the six great north faces of the Alps in a single season, and become the first person to do so.
The spring and summer weather were particularly bad that year, and she was forced to use alternative routes for the Grandes Jorasses and the Eiger. Without pictures to prove her success and with the use of alternative routes, the media and climbing community did not initially approve of her climb. In order to settle things, Hargreaves solo climbed the Croz spur on the north face of the Grandes Jorasses the following winter. With pictures taken from a professional photographer, the media and climbing community believed her claim.
