First Ascent of K2

Date: July 31, 1954 • Location: Thang, India

A team of Italian climbers became the first to reach the summit of K2, the world's second-highest mountain.

On the 1954 Italian expedition to K2, Achille Compagnoni and Lino Lacedelli became the first people to reach the summit of K2, 8,611 metres (28,251 ft), the second-highest mountain in the world. They reached the summit on 31 July 1954. K2 is more difficult to climb than Mount Everest, 8,849 metres (29,032 ft), which had first been climbed by a British expedition in 1953.