Tejbir Bura

Tejbir Bura was a Nepalese soldier, mountaineer and a gold medalist in alpinism, as he was recognized during the 1924 Winter Olympics for his participation in the 1922 British Mount Everest expedition. In 1922 he was a non-commissioned officer (NCO) of the 6th Gurkha Rifles, part of the British India Army, and held the rank of Naik, which in India is equivalent to the rank of corporal.

Olympic medal The father of the Modern Olympics, Pierre de Coubertin stated that an Olympic medal for alpinism should be awarded to the Mount Everest climbers who were part of the 1922 Everest expedition. The athletes who were part of that expedition received gold medals at the 1924 Winter Olympics, although they are not considered in the medal tallies of the International Olympic Committee. Tejbir Bura was the first Nepalese to win an Olympic medal, and he is still regarded as the only gold medalist for Nepal in its Olympic history, despite that his medal isn't recognised as official according to the rules of the IOC. His medal is in the collection of the Gurkha Museum in Winchester. Tejbir was not involved in the avalanche, his medal was in recognition of his achievements at an earlier stage of the expedition.

In mid-May 1922, while all of the other European expedition members were involved in the first attempt on the mountain, George Ingle Finch and Geoffrey Bruce remained at base-camp. Tejbir was also there. Bruce who was the expedition's transport officer and interpreter was also Tejbir's senior officer in the Gurkhas and neither of them had any experience of mountaineering on snow and ice. Finch was recovering from earlier efforts at altitude, he was also responsible for the rudimentary oxygen equipment that the expedition had taken and was working on repairs and modifications so that it could be trialled high on the mountain. When Finch was satisfied with his work on the oxygen equipment he was keen to head higher up the mountain and needed someone to accompany him. Despite their lack of mountaineering experience, Geoffrey Bruce and Tejbir agreed to join Finch when he left base-camp to head up the mountain on 16 May. On reaching Camp II Finch gave them both some training in using an ice-axe and other mountaineering equipment. The three climbers reached Camp III where Finch checked the oxygen cylinders which had previously been cached there, those were found to be in a good state. A few days were spent making sure that Bruce and Tejbir knew how to use the equipment and carrying out various oxygen trials. One of those trials, on 22 May, involved the three climbers using the oxygen equipment in an ascent to the North Col and then descending back to Camp III.

On 24 May Finch, Bruce and Tejbir once again climbed to the North Col, this time accompanied by John Noel who was the expedition's cameraman and cinematographer. They spent the night there and the following day Finch, Bruce and Tejbir set off from the camp at 8 a.m. to make an attempt on the summit using bottled oxygen. In the film that Noel made, Climbing Mount Everest, the three men can be seen roped together, each wearing an oxygen set, as they are setting off. Twelve porters carried extra oxygen bottles and other equipment without the aid of supplemental oxygen and it was clear that the three mountaineers, although having heavier loads, could climb faster than the porters. As the wind strengthened they erected camp at and the porters descended. During the night the rising wind forced snow into the tent and they were "all thickly covered in a fine frozen spindrift". The following day the party achieved another first when the reached on the north-east ridge, an altitude record which bettered the one set a few days earlier by Mallory, Somervell and Norton, After Tejbir started descending Finch and Bruce continued climbing the ridge, when they reached they were unable to continue any further and decided that they too must descend. They were re-united with Tejbir at their high camp, the three reached the Camp on the North Col at about 4 p.m, and continued their descent to Camp III. Nonetheless, Tejbir had "lost a good deal of skin from seven or eight fingers and a large patch off his foot, but though his frostbites were many, they were slight".