South Koreans today have something else to be proud about after a South Korean became the first woman to climb the 14 highest peaks in the Himalayas:

A South Korean mountaineer made history in the Himalayas on Tuesday by becoming the first woman to scale the world’s 14 highest mountains, beating a Spanish rival for the record.

Oh Eun-sun, 44, crawled on all fours for the final, steep stretch to the peak of Annapurna, her feat broadcast live in South Korea by KBS television.

At the top, she pulled out a South Korean flag, waved, and then wept before throwing up her arms and shouting: “Victory!”

Annapurna, at 26,545 feet (8,091 meters) above sea level, was the last of the 14 Himalayan peaks above the 8,000-meter level she had wanted to conquer.

She narrowly beat Edurne Pasaban of Spain to the 14th peak. Pasaban also was seeking to become the first woman to scale all 14 peaks, and had only the 26,330-foot-high (8,027-meter-high) Mount Shisha Pangma left on her list.

However, as Bill pointed out a few days ago, to paraphrase Kushibo, Oh may have pulled a Hwang Woo-suk on one of her climbs thus rendering her claim to climbing the 14 summits.  Until the investigation is complete her claim to the 14 summits will continue to be a point of controversy I’m sure.