Darjeeling, April 24: Nawang Gombu, the first man in the world to climb Mt Everest twice, died at his Darjeeling home this morning. He was 79.

According to a written statement issued by Gombu’s family, the mountaineer “died peacefully at his home (at 8.45am) today in Darjeeling surrounded by his family after a brief illness”.

Gombu had accompanied his uncle Tenzing Norgay Sherpa and Edmund Hillary as a support team member during the first successful ascent of Everest in 1953. He was one of the youngest members of the team then but did not make it to the top till 10 years later. He and Tenzing were among the first batch of Sherpas to be trained in Switzerland in 1954, following which the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute was set up in Darjeeling the same year.

Gombu climbed Mt Everest first in 1963 with American Jim Whittaker, followed by another ascent with Captain A.S. Cheema in 1965 as part of the first Indian team to scale the highest peak.

He was among the first batch of Sherpas, who came to be known as the “Tigers of the Snow” for scaling the Himalayas and bringing fame to his community in the region. Among the other Tigers are Nawang Topgay, who also lives in Darjeeling, and Tenzing. Gombu was the director of field training at HMI till 1998 and was currently serving as its honourary adviser.

In 1963, US President John F. Kennedy invited Gombu to the White House, while the UK conferred on him the Queen Elizabeth II Coronation medal. His Indian honours included the Padma Bhusan (1966), Padma Shri (1964), Arjuna Award (1965) and Tenzing Norgay Lifetime Achievement Award (2005) among others.

“He was perhaps the most decorated person in this region but he never carried his decorations in his day-to-day life,” said Dorjee Lhatoo, a 1984 Everester.

Born in southern Tibet near the Rongbuk monastery, Gombu was the son of a Tibetan monk, Nawang Gyaltzen, and Lhamu Kipa. He remembered the place where he was born simply as Donak, which means “black rock” in Tibetan. He briefly attended the Rongbuk monastery as a student but then moved to Khumjung Solu Khumbu village near Everest in Nepal with his parents and sister Doma, said a family member.

Gombu followed his uncle Tenzing to Darjeeling in the early fifties. The hill town was then the starting point of all Everest expeditions as Nepal had banned the entry of foreigners. The ascent on Everest till then was from the Tibet side. Climbers then followed the Kalimpong-Jelep-la-Tibet route. The pass was open till India and China went to war in 1962.

Gombu’s funeral will be held in Darjeeling on Thursday.