AFA grads help make history with 7 summit challenge

29,000 feet isn’t a new height for 6 airmen, but it was the first time a military team made it that high with only their feet.

“Puts things into perspective about being small,” said Captain Colin Merrin.

Merrin, Captain Marshall Klitzke and Major Rob Marshall are Air Force Academy graduates that were a part of the USAF Seven Summits challenge team whose goal was to put airmen on the top of the highest mountains on every continent. Mount Everest was the final challenge, making it to the top May 20 th .

“You’re climbing for days and days just going up and you’re still not even close to the top,” Merrin said.

Merrin was one of two team members that had to make one of the hardest decisions of their life, and turn back on the final ascent to the top. Merrin was battling a respiratory infection.

“I could see this dead body, 10-15 feet away from me and that really made the decision more real, this is not a mountain you mess around on,” Merrin said.

Marshall Klitzke was lucky, his health held up to endure the grueling climb to 29,029 feet.

“The summit is such a short 15 minutes, really the climb, as clich as it is, it’s the journey, it’s the whole experience,” Klitzke said.

The team says they risked everything to remember fallen comrades and raise tens of thousands of dollars for military charities.

“Hopefully it helps other people see that if you put yourself out there, kind of risk a big fail, you can come up with a big success,” Klitzke said.

Team members paid for the climbs with their own savings and used personal leave time for the journeys.