An inspirational climber who had already survived cancer died attempting to summit Nepal’s Mount Makalu. Alexander Pancoe was 39 years old when he passed away at Camp 2 this past weekend. The trip to scale the world’s fifth highest peak was also a fund-raising effort for an important cause. Pancoe had a brain tumor as a young man and was battling leukemia, but he continued to do what he loved, helping and inspiring others along the way.
Pancoe was a seasoned climber and adventurer. CBS News reports that he’d climbed Everest and many other peaks, raising money for Chicago’s Lurie Children’s Hospital, where he had received treatment many years ago. CBS says he’d raised over $1 million for the cause.
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Pancoe was also a husband and a father to two young children. Pancoe’s wife, Nina, posted a heartbreaking tribute to her Instagram page, writing: “The moment I received that call from a satellite number I wanted to think it was nothing but deep down I knew something was very wrong. At first I thought you broke a bone, but to hear those words that your heart stopped and CPR was not working my heart shattered into a million pieces. I knew you were gone.”
Watch CBS News Chicago’s tribute to Pancoe, the climber who survived cancer and gave so much back to the cancer community, here:
Header stock image of Mount Makalu by DanielPrudek via Getty