Norgay is the son of mountaineer and guide Tenzing Norgay (who first climbed Mount Everest in 1953 with Sir Edmund Hillary) and Daku, his third wife. Jamling Tenzing Norgay himself later followed in his father's footsteps and climbed Everest in 1996 with a team led by David Breashears that also included mountaineer Ed Viesturs and Araceli Segarra, an experience documented in the 1998 IMAX film Everest. In 2002, he and Peter Hillary, the son of Edmund Hillary, were part of an expedition to climb Everest and commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first ascent.