Nepal Just Proposed Renaming Annapurna. Here's Why — and Why It Isn't That Simple
Weeks after Nirmal 'Nimsdai' Purja died on Broad Peak, his home municipality wants to rename the world's deadliest 8,000m peak in his honour — a plan that still needs Kathmandu's sign-off and a French family's blessing.
At a glance
- Published
- TopicRecords & People
- Verified againstExplorersWeb
- Treks coveredGhorepani Poon Hill Trek — 4 Days, Annapurna Circuit Trek — 10 Days, Annapurna Base Camp Trek — 9 Days
Nepal's Annapurna Rural Municipality has formally asked the federal government in Kathmandu to rename Annapurna I — the world's tenth-highest mountain, and by Guinness World Records' own count, the deadliest 8,000m peak on Earth — after Nirmal 'Nimsdai' Purja, the Nepali climbing legend who died in an avalanche on Broad Peak on 30 July 2026. If approved, the 8,091m summit would become 'Nimsdai Annapurna.'
Key facts
- Annapurna Rural Municipality approved the renaming request on 18 August 2026, alongside plans for a statue and museum
- Nirmal Purja died in an avalanche on Broad Peak, Pakistan, on 30 July 2026, with nine other climbers
- Purja was born in Dana village, inside the same municipality, in Myagdi district
- The plan also proposes renaming the historic Maurice Herzog Trail to the 'Nimsdai Maurice Herzog Trail'
- Renaming an internationally recognised peak needs approval from Nepal's federal government — the municipality cannot do it alone
Why Annapurna, and why now
Purja became a household name in 2019 after 'Project Possible' — climbing all 14 of the world's 8,000m peaks in six months and six days, smashing a record that had stood at nearly eight years. He summited Annapurna I itself more than once, both during that record run and on later commercial expeditions with his company, Elite Exped. When he died on Broad Peak this July, alongside nine other climbers in a single avalanche, Nepal lost its most globally recognised living mountaineer.
His home municipality moved fast. On 18 August, local officials approved a package of tributes: a life-size statue (the site is still undecided, likely near one of Annapurna's base camps), a museum close to his birthplace in Dana, and — the most consequential of the three — a formal request to rename the mountain itself. Municipality chair Bharat Kumar Pun has said the council will consult the family of French mountaineer Maurice Herzog before the trail renaming goes further, since Herzog and Louis Lachenal made the first-ever ascent of an 8,000m peak here, on this mountain, in 1950.
The mountain doing the honouring is not a small one
Renaming a trail is a symbolic gesture. Renaming Annapurna I itself would touch a peak with a genuinely fearsome statistical record. Guinness World Records lists Annapurna I as the 'deadliest Himalayan mountain': as of February 2025, it had recorded 75 deaths across 559 ascents, a 13.42% fatality rate — still the highest of any 8,000m peak, decades after climbers stopped needing supplemental oxygen to reach any Himalayan summit at all.
Maurice Herzog and Louis Lachenal reach the summit — the first people ever to stand on an 8,000m peak. Herzog loses all his fingers and toes to frostbite on the descent.
Purja climbs all fourteen 8,000m peaks, including Annapurna I, in six months and six days — a record that once stood at nearly eight years.
Purja is killed in an avalanche in Pakistan alongside nine other climbers.
Statue, museum and a renaming request for both the peak and the Maurice Herzog Trail — pending federal approval.
What this means for trekkers
What this means for you
Nothing changes on the ground yet, and nothing may change at all — a peak rename needs sign-off in Kathmandu, consultation with Herzog's family, and almost certainly the agreement of international mapping bodies before 'Nimsdai Annapurna' appears on a permit, a map or a trail sign. Your ACAP and TIMS permits will read 'Annapurna' for the foreseeable future. What the story does confirm is how much weight Purja's name now carries in the villages that produce Nepal's guides and porters — reason enough, if you're weighing where to trek, to see the region he called home for yourself.
The Annapurna Circuit and the shorter Annapurna Base Camp trek both pass within sight of the peak at the centre of this debate, without any of the technical risk of an 8,000m climb — the fatality numbers above belong to mountaineers on the summit route, not trekkers on the trail below. We'll update this article the moment Kathmandu makes a decision.
Sources: ExplorersWeb, Guinness World Records, Annapurna Rural Municipality.
Cover photo: Thomas Hummel via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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