The race to save Russian mountain climber Natalia Nagovitsyna from the icy summit of Kyrgyzstan’s highest mountain is still on.

Russia’s chief investigator Alexander Bastrykin, responding to an appeal from Nagovitsyna’s son Mikhail, has ordered urgent coordination with Kyrgyz emergency officials to mount an attempt at rescuing the 48-year-old mountaineer. She has been trapped with a broken leg for more than two weeks in freezing weather on Jengish Chokusu, or Victory Peak, a mountain near the border with China with a height of 7,439 metres (24,406 feet).

Natalia Nagovitsyna's son Mikhail urged Russian officials to launch a rescue attempt, saying he was convinced his mother, pictured, is still alive (Credit: Radio Azattyk, screenshot).

The effort to save Nagovitsyna is made all the more poignant by the fact that four years ago her husband, Sergei Nagovitsyn, perished after he became paralysed and incapacitated during an expedition on the mountain of Khan-Tengri, located on the Kazakhstan-Kyrgyzstan-China tri-point. Also, on August 15 Italian mountaineer Luca Sinigaglia died during an attempt to evacuate Nagovitsyna.

Bastrykin’s August 25 order to his staff to pursue “comprehensive measures” with Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry was reported by The Moscow Times on August 26.

On August 19, Kyrgyz officials said a drone flyover found Nagovitsyna alive in a damaged tent, a week after the accident in which she broke her leg while descending the mountain, the highest in the Tian Shan system of mountain ranges. In his appeal, Mikhail said the drone footage reassured him that his mother was still alive, though some experts have voiced growing doubts about her survival prospects in extremely poor weather and with dwindling supplies of food, water and fuel.

On August 25, TASS reported Alexander Yakovenko, chairman of the Commission on Classical Mountaineering of the Russian Mountaineering Federation, as saying that because of poor weather, rescuers were not prepared to relaunch the surveillance drone.

* Video report picturing the desperate situation faced by trapped climber Natalia Nagovitsyna, but please note there is no translation.

Radio Azattyk reported on August 26 that drone footage taken on August 19 showed Nagovitsyna’s tent torn apart by winds, with one side blown away.

Eduard Kubatov, president of the Kyrgyz Mountaineering Federation, told the media outlet that despite previous reports that the rescue mission had been indefinitely suspended, no final decision on bringing it to an end had been taken. He added that the rescue operation has become international.

He was further cited as saying that Jengish Chokusu is one of the 10 most difficult mountains to climb in the world with around a third of people who attempt the feat dying in the process, and adding: "Only climbers can rescue climbers at [such] altitude. Because only they are used to climbing at such heights, they know those routes.

“The best sports training is required there. In other words, it is necessary to save a person at such a high altitude. Only professional climbers can do it. Neither [Kyrgyzstan’s] Ministry of Emergency Situations nor Ministry of Defence can carry out rescue operations at altitudes above 5,000 metres."

During repeated attempts to save Nagovitsyna, a helicopter was forced into a hard landing, with several aboard suffering injuries as a result.

Both Jengish Chokusu and Khan-Tengri are members of the so-called Snow Leopard group of mountains, five 7,000-ft-plus peaks found across the former Soviet Union. Only around 700 people, including 30 women, have accomplished the feat of climbing all five.