Survivor reaches K2 base camp

Hobbling on frostbitten feet, an Italian climber walked down to K2 base camp yesterday after heavy mists ruled out an airlift for the last survivor of the worst disaster on the world's second-highest mountain.

"I'm at base camp. I'm truly happy, to be here finally and to be alive," 37-year-old Italian climber Marco Confortola was quoted as saying after speaking by satellite telephone to the Italian mountaineering website www.montagna.tv.

"I now realize that they're all dead, they're all dead."