The son of King Amadeus of Spain (who was also the Duke d'Aosta in Italy), Abruzzi was the first to ascend Mount St. Elias (Saint Elias, Mount) in Alaska (1897). His 1899 Arctic expedition reached latitude 86°34′ N—a record for the time. In 1906 he was the first to scale the highest summits of the Ruwenzori Range in east-central Africa. His expedition investigated the geology, topography, and glaciology of the range; it mapped the range and named its major peaks, passes, and glaciers. In 1909 Abruzzi climbed the world's second highest mountain, K2, in the Himalayas, to a height of more than 20,000 feet (6,000 m). During World War I he held a naval command in the Adriatic until 1917. He was later involved in exploration and colonization in Italian Somaliland.