Scott Lehmann and Shayna Unger are deaf mountaineers, educators, storytellers, and Mountain Hardwear athletes. Both were born into multigenerational deaf families and raised in the deaf community. Growing up, there was limited deaf representation in the outdoors, and they faced barriers to outdoor education due to communication challenges. It wasn’t until after college that they taught themselves how to climb mountains by studying YouTube videos and communicating with other climbers on the mountains using paper and pen.
Over the past ten years, Scott and Shayna have climbed the world’s highest peaks together. They became the first deaf Americans to summit Mount Everest and Lhotse, and in doing so, the first deaf individuals to complete a back-to-back double ascent of 8,000-meter peaks in just 26 hours. They also became the first deaf individuals in the world to summit three additional 8,000-meter peaks, Makalu, Manaslu, and Kangchenjunga, and were part of the first all deaf team to summit Denali.
Scott and Shayna launched the project Seeing Beyond: Seven Summits with the goal of becoming the first deaf individuals to complete the Seven Summits while raising awareness, improving access to information and education, increasing deaf and disabled representation, and inspiring their community to explore the outdoors.