A Lake Forest man, who was the father of two young children and a philanthropist, died while climbing in the Himalaya mountains to raise money for cancer research.
Alex Pancoe, 39, of Lake Forest, died unexpectedly on Sunday evening at Camp 2 on Makalu, the fifth-highest mountain on Earth.
Madison Mountaineering, a Seattle-based mountain guide service, said Pancoe was sharing a tent with the organization’s expedition leader and guide, Terray Sylvester.
The two had just finished dinner and were settling into their sleeping bags while chatting casually when Pancoe suddenly became unresponsive.
Sylvester and the team of climbers and Sherpa at Camp 2 conducted hours of resuscitation but were unable to revive him.
Pancoe had been in “high spirits, full of energy” earlier in the day. He was considered one of the strongest members of the team.
“He had been thoroughly enjoying the expedition. Above all, Alex was a devoted father who spoke often and lovingly about his children—they were the center of his world. His passing is a tremendous loss, and our hearts go out to his family during this incredibly difficult time,” Madison Mountaineering said.
The man’s wife, Nina Laski Pancoe, said the moment she received the call from a satellite phone number, she wanted to believe nothing was wrong but deep down she “knew something was very wrong.”
“At first I thought you broke a bone, but to hear those words that your heart stopped and CPR was not working my heart shattered into a million pieces. I knew you were gone,” Nina Pancoe said.
She said that her and her husband had a “fairytale romance” and that he “lit up my entire world.”
“Our time together was cut short, but the memories we made will last forever. We traveled the world, we climbed mountains, we made each other constantly laugh, but most importantly we loved each other with our whole hearts,” Nina Pancoe said.
She said the last words that her husband texted her on the mountain were “I love you.”
Alex Pancoe, a Highland Park native, was diagnosed in 2005 with a brain tumor that was successfully operated on at Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago.
He climbed Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa in 2016, which he previously described as a “life-changing adventure” that led to him falling “in love with adventure, overcoming fear, and pushing my physical and mental limits.”
Alex Pancoe began pursuing a dream of completing the Explorer’s Grand Slam — a challenge that involves climbing the seven summits and skiing to both the North and South Poles.
He raised awareness, shared other patients’ journeys and raised funds for pediatric brain tumor research at Lurie Children’s Hospital while pursuing the dream.
Alex Pancoe completed the Explorer’s Grand Slam in 2019, raising almost $500,000 in the process.
While climbing Ama Dablam in the Himalayan range in 2023, Pancoe said he became extremely hypoxic and struggled with the altitude.
He was diagnosed months later with chronic myeloid leukemia and underwent almost two years of treatment to manage it before attempting to climb Makalu where he died.
“It’s going to be a huge challenge for me – climbing at altitude is plenty hard without a chronic ailment – but I look forward to rising to the challenge,” he said in a previous blog post.
Nina Pancoe said her husband never let his medical challenges stop him.
“You lived each day to the fullest making an impact on the world around you. You are the kindest, sweetest, most passionate person I have ever met. I am beyond lost without my Alex,” she said.
“We were a team who could conquer anything together and conquering life without you breaks my heart. You died doing something you loved in a place that you loved,” she added.
Pancoe leaves behind a 7-month-old girl and a 2-year-old boy.