The fourth-highest peak in the world, Lhotse (8501 m) in the Himalayas was first climbed on 18 May 1956 by the Swiss team of Ernst Reiss and Fritz Luchsinger, and in winter, on 31 December 1988, by a Polish expedition led by Krzysztof Wielicki.

Falling towards the south, the almost vertical wall of Lhotse (8501 m) and the side summit of Lhotse Shar (8382 m), is considered by all Himalayan climbers to be one of the greatest challenges of sport Himalayanism, the most dangerous and wild mountain cliffs in the world. It has been attacked by more than a dozen international expeditions. Unsuccessfully. The legendary Lhotse wall has been tackled by the best Himalayan climbers, including an expedition led by Reinhold Messner with the participation of the no less famous Christoph Profit. Also without success. Poles also tried. Unfortunately... they paid for the ascent with their lives. They were commemorated at Lhotse near the small village of Chhukhung inhabited by several hundred Sherpas. In accordance with Tibetan tradition, a stone obelisk popularly known as the "Chorten of Kukuczka" was erected. It is a symbolic grave of Polish Himalayan climbers who died during the ascent of the south face of Lhotse.

Their names and dates of death are immortalised on the monument on a brass plaque with the Polish emblem:

Rafal Chołda 25.X.1985

Czesław Jakiel 15.IX.1987

Jerzy Kukuczka 24.X.1989

Rafał Chołda died during the retreat from an unsuccessful summit attack. He fell into an abyss in unclimbed snow-rock terrain at an altitude of 8,000m.

Czesław Jakiel - expedition doctor - died as a result of a blast from a serac avalanche on a glacier at 5300 metres during the approach to Camp I.

Jerzy Kukuczka - described by mountaineers from around the world and specialist media as "the best Himalayan climber of all time", fell off a wall at 8200 metres and fell to his death on the spot. Considered a Polish national hero, he was the second person in the world to climb all 14 eight-thousand-metre peaks. He did it without the help of Sherpas, mostly on new routes or in winter. He used oxygen only once.

During the tragic drama that took place in 1989, Jerzy Kukuczka's partner was Ryszard Pawłowski. He recalled the expedition on RFM FM radio as follows:

"It was morning, 24 October 1989 (...). We cooked something to drink, we didn't eat much. Jurek took off first. We were tied together with a single rope. We had arranged it that way beforehand to speed up our climbing. Once Jurek was at some height above me, about 40 metres away, he suddenly started to slide down a kind of slab covered with snow. It seemed to trigger some sort of flight, which I thought Jurek had set up by leading it. On the other hand, I noticed with horror that it was gaining more and more speed and I actually predicted what might happen - that there would be a massive tug on my position. All I could actually do was huddle inside myself and prepare myself for what was to come. And indeed it did - there was a tug, but it didn't pull me out of my position, which wasn't - shall we say - very good.

After that jerk, I felt the slack in the rope, not much, I noticed Jurek falling below. I knew that a tragedy had occurred. The rope broke on some sharp part of the rock. And I was left alone. The situation was dramatic. After a moment of freezing, of being so frightened, after it occurred to me what had happened, I thought I had to save myself now. The wall is positioned in such a way that from the base the boys couldn't watch us, and Jurek had fallen with the radio. So I knew that by the time anyone found out about this tragedy, it might be too late, so I started to prepare for the descent. I cut a piece of rope from the railing below, and then I descended some sections using up to two ice axes. In difficult places, I tried to use the rope I had with me, actually a cut piece of rope. Along the way, I also caught a bivouac at eight thousand, because my headlamp had fallen off. I bivouacked at eight thousand on such slabs and the next day, already near my tent, probably at 7600 metres, I spotted my colleagues who came out to meet me."

What was the cause of this tragedy? We will never know why Jerzy Kukuczka fell off the wall. One thing is certain.

Both partners were tied together by a thin 7 mm rope, suitable in fact only for descents, because the belay of the leading climber with it was illusory - as assessed by the authors of the book Polish Himalayas(Janusz Kurczab, Wojciech Fusk and Jerzy Porębski. - Kukuczka was leading. He had already moved considerably away from the belaying Pawłowski and was not visible - he climbed behind a rock fold. The terrain was difficult and the rope moved slowly. As Jurek approached the mid-rib of the wall, where the main difficulties ended, an accident occurred. The rope couldn't withstand the powerful jerk after a fall of several tens of metres and broke. There was no more rescue for Jurek Kukuczka. He fell into a three-kilometre abyss.

Jerzy Kukuczka died on the same mountain on which he had started his Himalayan successes almost ten years earlier. In 1979, after conquering Lhotse, the first peak he had climbed above eight thousand metres, he set out to conquer another thirteen.

In his autobiographical book 'My Vertical World', he confessed:

Finally, the greatest moment in any climb. The moment when I am only a few steps away from the summit, when I know that nothing will stand in my way anymore, when I know that I have won.... I have conquered not the mountain or the weather, but above all myself, my weakness and my fear. When I can now thank the mountain for being kind to me this time too. I will not give these moments away to anyone for any price, and if I have to overcome obstacles on my way to the summit and tread the never-to-be-determined line between calculated risk and risk-taking, then I hardly agree. (...)I agree to winds that beat against the walls of the tents for weeks on end and drive me to the brink of madness. I agree to roads driven to the edge of endurance. I agree to struggle. The reward I receive for these hardships is immensely great. It is the joy of living.

Earlier, another Polish tragedy took place on the deadly mountain Lhotse. In December 1974, a young director and actor, Stanisław Latałło, who took part as a cameraman in the Polish expedition led by Andrzej Zawada, died at an altitude of 7,400 metres.

Today, those who dreamed of conquering the legendary, almost vertical cliff of Lhotse are commemorated by a stone obelisk. The chorten, as the plaque reads: 'Heroes of the South Face of Lhotse', was erected by the Jerzy Kukuczka Polish Mountaineering Support Foundation and Babu Sherpa's Mountain Tribes, and unveiled on 22 March 2008 by the participants of the Polish expedition to Dhaulagiri, Artur Hajzer and Robert Szymczak. During the ceremony, prayers in Buddhist ritual were said by a lama from the temple in Pangboche: an offering was made, prayer flags were hung.

After the ceremony, Artur Hajzer said:

Rafał Chołda was my only true friend and rope partner with whom I took my first steps in the mountains; I also had the honour of climbing four eight-thousand-metre peaks with Jurek Kukuczka; I dedicated three seasons to the south face of Lhotse (in total my "I dedicated three seasons to the south face of Lhotse (in total, my "career"), I spent dozens of days there - the moments at the chorten moved me to the depths - when I think back to those times and those great people, there is only sorrow and regret.