Ingrid Baeyens

Ingrid M. Baeyens (8 January 1956 in Ramsel, Belgium) is a Belgian mountaineer and physical therapist. She became the first woman to summit the South Face of Annapurna in 1991, and the first Belgian woman to summit Mount Everest in 1992.

Biography Ingrid Baeyens was born in Ramsel, Antwerp, Belgium on 8 January 1956.

She began mountaineering in the Alps in the early 1980s.

She would go on to climb in the Andes with her husband Wim Verbist, until he died in 1987 during a climb in Peru. Makalu would not be summitted successfully in winter until nearly 20 years later, in 2009.

She summitted four eight-thousanders, including the South Face of Annapurna. After becoming the first Belgian woman to summit Everest in 1992, she retired from climbing in the Himalayas. At the time, she was the female mountaineer with the most eight-thousanders after Wanda Rutkiewicz. After their team created a snow cave for them to rest, they were successfully helicoptered to safety.

Notable ascents and attempts

Gasherbrum II (8,035 m) 8 August 1988 Dhaulagiri (8,167 m) 11 May 1990 Unsuccessful winter attempt of Makalu (8,463 m), in December 1990 with Krzysztof Wielicki