KATHMANDU, March 16 (Xinhua) -- A mountaineering expedition team consisting of Bahraini Prince Sheikh Mohamed Hamad Mohamed Al Khalifa arrived in Nepal on Monday with the aim of summiting Mt. Qomolangma this spring season, the company organizing their expedition and the airport authority confirmed.

Five months after climbing the 8,163m high Mt. Manaslu in October, last year, a 16-member team consisting of Al Khalifa and other mountaineers arrived in Nepal on Monday evening, according to Mingma Sherpa, chairperson of Seven Summit Treks, the expedition organizing company based in Nepal.

"The expedition team comprising 13 Bahraini nationals and three British nationals will make (an) attempt to summit Mt. Qomolangma this spring," Sherpa told Xinhua on Monday.

Mt. Qomolangma, which lies between the border of Nepal and China, is the world's tallest peak with a height of 8,848.86 meters as per the recently revised height. This Himalayan mountain which is known as Sagarmatha in Nepal, attracts thousands of foreign tourists every year and is an important source of tourism-related earnings for Nepal.

"A chartered flight carrying the mountaineering team consisting of Bahraini Royal family members landed at Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) in Kathmandu 6.45pm (local time)," a duty officer at TIA told Xinhua on Monday evening. Deo Chandra Lal Karna, spokesperson at the TIA also confirmed the arrival of the team.

After landing at the airport, the team had moved to a hotel where they will spend seven days in hotel quarantine as per the Nepali government's rule to prevent the spread of COVID-19, according to Sherpa.

The mostly same expedition team had climbed Mt. Manaslu in western Nepal and Mt. Lobuche (6,619m), in eastern Nepal last year as a part of the preparation to summit Mt. Qomolangma this spring. "The team has once again arrived in Nepal to complete this mission," said Sherpa.

According to him, his company has already initiated the process for obtaining climbing permits from the Department of Tourism, a government authority responsible for issuing climbing permits. The department said that it has so far issued permits for two expedition groups to climb Mt. Nuptse (7864m) and Mt. Manaslu for this spring. Enditem

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