Media & press
Netflix. TEDx. National Geographic.
Dr. Sara was high on Everest when the 2015 earthquake struck, and is one of the survivors in Netflix's Aftershock. Her talk on climbing the impossible has been watched by tens of thousands, and her work with at-risk girls has been covered by National Geographic. Here is all of it in one place.
Netflix
Aftershock
On 25 April 2015 Dr. Sara was on Mount Everest, climbing to fund scholarships for girls in Nepal, when a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck. She survived the avalanche at around 20,000 feet. Twenty-two people died at base camp. That earthquake is the subject of the Netflix series Aftershock, in which she is one of the survivors who tell what happened.
It is the rarest kind of credential: not a story she tells about herself, but a day independently reported and released to a global audience — one where the worst thing that could happen, happened, and she went back anyway.
For interviews about the earthquake, the descent, or the decision to return to the mountain, get in touch.
TEDx
Climb Your Everest
Her TEDx talk, given at TEDxIHEParis — the twelve minutes that gave the whole body of work its name.
What the talk is about
In 2012 Dr. Sara was at a personal development seminar where the exercise was to name a goal you believed was impossible. She named Everest. She had never climbed a mountain, never slept in a sleeping bag, and — by her own account — did not know the difference between base camp and a summit.
The talk is what happened next, and the method she took from it: that an impossible goal is mostly a goal nobody has broken into steps yet, and that the fastest way up your own mountain is to be carrying someone else up theirs.
Press
Selected coverage
National Geographic
This woman climbs to empower girls around the globe
A profile of the climbs and the scholarships they fund.
UCLA Magazine
Peak Effort
Her own university on the double Bruin who went from an electrical engineering master’s to the highest point on every continent.
IranWire
50 Iranian-Americans you should know
Listed among the Iranian-Americans whose work is worth knowing about.
Podcast
Tough Girl Challenges
On aiming to become the first Iranian to climb the Seven Summits, and trekking 335 miles across the Greenland ice cap.
For producers and editors
Interview topics
- Surviving the 2015 Nepal earthquake at altitude on Everest — and going back.
- Becoming the first Iranian in history to climb the Seven Summits, having started with no climbing experience at all.
- From electrical engineering to expedition leadership, and what transfers between them.
- Girls' education, trafficking and early marriage in Nepal — and what funding actually changes.
- Women in engineering, and the immigrant arc from Tehran to a UCLA scholarship.
Dr. Sara is available for interviews, panels, podcasts and documentary contributions. Get in touch.
Video
More to watch
Press enquiry?
Interviews, podcasts, panels and documentary contributions — tell Dr. Sara the angle and the deadline.