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About Mount Everest

'Mount Everest' or 'Qomolangma' or 'Sagarmatha' (सगरमाथा) or 'Chomolungma' (ཇོ་མོ་གླང་མ) pronounced as (Jongmalunga) is the highest mountain on Earth, as measured by the height of its summit above sea level. The mountain, which is part of the Himalaya range in High Asia, is located on the border between Nepal and Tibet, China. As of the end of the 2006 climbing season, there have been 3,050 ascents to the summit, by 2,062 individuals, and 203 people have died on the mountain. The conditions on the mountain are so difficult that most of the corpses have been left where they fell; some of them are easily visible from the standard climbing routes.
Climbers are a significant source of tourist revenue for Nepal; they range from experienced mountaineers to relative novices who count on their paid guides to get them to the top. The Nepalese government also requires a permit from all prospective climbers; this carries a heavy fee, often more than $25,000 (USD) per person. ^[4]

Contents

Naming

Measurement

Comparisons

Climbing routes

Southeast ridge

Northeast ridge

Ascents

Early expeditions

First successful ascent by Tenzing and Hillary

1996 disaster

2003 - 50th Anniversary of First Ascent

2005 - Helicopter landing

2006 - North Face ski descent

2006 - David Sharp controversy

Death zone

Bottled oxygen controversy

Life-threatening thefts

Life forms

See also

Image gallery

External links

References

Naming

The Tibetan name for Mount Everest is 'Chomolungma' or 'Qomolangma' (ཇོ་མོ་གླིང་མ, translated as "Mother of the Universe" or "Goddess Mother of the Snows"), and the related Chinese name is 'Zhūmùlǎngmǎ Fēng' () or 'Shèngmǔ Fēng' ().
According to English accounts of the mid-19th century, the local name in Darjeeling for Mount Everest was ''Deodungha'', or "Holy Mountain."[1]. In the 1960s, the Government of Nepal gave the mountain an official Nepali name: 'Sagarmatha' (सगरमाथा), meaning "Head of the Sky".
In 1865, the mountain was given its English name by Andrew Waugh, the British . With both Nepal and Tibet closed to foreign travel, he wrote:

I was taught by my respected chief and predecessor, Colonel Sir George Everest to assign to every geographical object its true local or native appellation. But here is a mountain, most probably the highest in the world, without any local name that we can discover, whose native appellation, if it has any, will not very likely be ascertained before we are allowed to penetrate into Nepal. In the meantime the privilege as well as the duty devolves on me to assign…a name whereby it may be known among citizens and geographers and become a household word among civilized nations.

Waugh chose to name the mountain after George Everest, first using the spelling 'Mont Everest', and then 'Mount Everest'. However, the modern pronunciation of Everest (IPA: or (EV-er-est)) is in fact different from Sir George's own pronunciation of his surname, which was (EAVE-rest).
In the late nineteenth century many European cartographers incorrectly believed that a native name for the mountain was "Gaurisankar".^[5] This was a result of confusion of Mount Everest with the actual Gauri Sankar, which, when viewed from Kathmandu, stands almost directly in front of Everest.
In the early 1960s, the Nepalese government realized that Mount Everest had no Nepalese name. This was because the mountain was not known and named in ethnic Nepal (that is, the Kathmandu valley and surrounding areas). The government set out to find a name for the mountain (the Sherpa/Tibetan name ''Chomolangma'' was not acceptable, as it would have been against the idea of unification (Nepalization) of the country. The name 'Sagarmatha' (सगरमाथा) was thus invented by Baburam Acharya.
In 2002, the Chinese ''People's Daily'' newspaper published an article making a case against the continued use of the English name for the mountain in the Western world, insisting that it should be referred to by its Tibetan name. The newspaper argued that the Chinese (in nature a Tibetan) name preceded the English one, as Mount Qomolangma was marked on a Chinese map more than 280 years ago.^[6]

Measurement

Radhanath Sikdar, an Indian mathematician and surveyor from Bengal, was the first to identify Everest as the world's highest peak in 1852, using trigonometric calculations based on measurements of "Peak XV" (as it was then known) made with theodolites from 240 km (150 miles) away in India. Measurement could not be made from closer due to a lack of access to Nepal. Peak XV was found to be exactly 29,000 feet (8,839 m) high, but was publicly declared to be 29,002 feet (8,840 m). The arbitrary addition of 2 feet (0.6 m) was to avoid the impression that an exact height of 29,000 feet was nothing more than a rounded estimate.
More recently, the mountain has been found to be 8,848 m (29,028 feet) high, although there is some variation in the measurements. The mountain K2 comes in second at 8,611 m (28,251 ft) high. On May 22, 2005, the People's Republic of China's Everest Expedition Team ascended to the top of the mountain. After several months' complicated measurement and calculation, on October 9, 2005, the PRC's State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping officially announced the height of Everest as 8,844.43 m ± 0.21 m (29,017.16 ± 0.69 ft). They claimed it was the most accurate measurement to date.^[7] But this new height is based on the actual highest point of rock and not on the snow and ice that sits on top of that rock on the summit, so, in keeping with the practice used on Mont Blanc and Khan Tangiri Shyngy, it is not shown here. The Chinese also measured a snow/ice depth of 3.5 m,^[8] which implies agreement with a net elevation of 8,848 m. But in reality the snow and ice thickness varies, making a definitive height of the snow cap, and hence the precise height attained by summiteers without sophisticated GPS, impossible to determine.
The elevation of was first determined by an Indian survey in 1955, made closer to the mountain, also using theodolites. It was subsequently reaffirmed by a 1975 Chinese measurement.^[9] In both cases the snow cap, not the rock head, was measured. In May 1999 an American Everest Expedition, directed by Bradford Washburn, anchored a GPS unit into the highest bedrock. A rock head elevation of 8,850 m (29,035 ft), and a snow/ice elevation 1 m (3 ft) higher, were obtained via this device.^[10] Although it has not been officially recognized by Nepal,^[11] this figure is widely quoted. Geoid uncertainty casts doubt upon the accuracy claimed by both the 1999 and 2005 surveys.
A detailed photogrammetric map (at a scale of 1:50,000) of the Khumbu region, including the south side of Mount Everest, was made by Erwin Schneider as part of the 1955 International Himalayan Expedition, which also attempted Lhotse. An even more detailed topographic map of the Everest area was made in the late 1980s under the direction of Bradford Washburn, using extensive aerial photography.
It is thought that the plate tectonics of the area are adding to the height and moving the summit north-eastwards. Two accounts,^[12][13] suggest the rates of change are 4 mm per year (upwards) 3-6 mm per year (northeastwards), but another account mentions more lateral movement (27 mm),^[14]
and even shrinkage has been suggested.^[15]
The Mount Everest region, and the Himalayas in general, are thought to be experiencing ice-melt due to global warming.^[16] The exceptionally heavy southwest summer monsoon of 2005 is consistent with continued warming and augmented convective uplift on the Tibetan plateau to the north.

Comparisons

Everest is the mountain whose summit attains the greatest distance above sea level. Several other mountains are sometimes claimed as alternative "tallest mountains on Earth". Mauna Kea in Hawaii is tallest when measured from its base;^[17] it rises over when measured from its base on the mid-ocean floor, but only attains above sea level.
By the same measure of base to summit, Denali, in Alaska, is also taller than Everest. Despite its height above sea level of only , Denali sits atop a sloping plain with elevations from 300-900 m (1,000-3,000 ft), yielding a height above base in the range of 5,300-5,900 m (17,300-19,300 ft); a commonly quoted figure is .^[18] By comparison, reasonable base elevations for Everest range from on the south side to on the Tibetan Plateau, yielding a height above base in the range of 3,650 m (12,000 ft) to 4,650 m (15,300 ft).^[19].
The summit of Chimborazo in Ecuador is farther from the Earth's centre (6,384.4 km or 3,967.1 mi) than that of Everest (6,382.3 km or 3,965.8 mi), because the Earth bulges at the Equator. However, Chimborazo attains a height of only above sea level, and by this criterion it is not even the highest peak of the Andes.
The deepest spot in the ocean is deeper than Everest is high: the Challenger Deep, located in the Mariana Trench, is so deep that if Everest were to be placed into it there would be more than 2 km (1.25 mi) of water covering it.

Climbing routes

View from space showing South Col route and North Col/Ridge route

Image:Himalaya_annotated.jpg|thumb|250px|right|Southern and northern climbing routes as seen from the International Space Station.
rect 58 14 160 49 . A crucial decision affecting the fate of Sharp is shown in the program, where an early returning climber (Max Chaya) is descending and radios to his base camp manager (Russell Brice) that he has found a climber in distress. He is unable to identify Sharp, and Sharp had chosen to climb solo without any support, so he did not identify himself to other climbers. The base camp manager assumes that Sharp is part of a group that has abandoned him, and informs his climber that there is no chance of him being able to help Sharp [at 8000+ meters in altitude, barely anyone has the strength to help another man who is only semi concious, and Max Chaya is only an amateur mountaineer].
As Sharp's condition deteriorates through the day and other descending climbers pass him, his opportunities for rescue diminish: his legs and feet curl from frost-bite, preventing him from walking; the later descending climbers are lower on oxygen and lack the strength to offer aid; time runs out for any Sherpas to return and rescue him. Most importantly, Sharp's decision to forgo all support leaves him with no margin for recovery.
As this debate raged, on May 26, Australian climber Lincoln Hall was found alive, after being declared dead the day before. He was found by a party of four climbers (Dan Mazur, Andrew Brash, Myles Osborne and Jangbu Sherpa) who, giving up their own summit attempt, stayed with Hall and descended with him and a party of 11 Sherpas sent up to carry him down. Hall later fully recovered.

Death zone

Main articles: Death zone

While conditions for any area classified as a death zone apply to Mount Everest (altitudes higher than 8,000 m), it is significantly more difficult for a climber to survive at the death zone on Mount Everest. Temperatures can dip to very low levels, resulting in frostbite of any body part exposed to the air. Because temperatures are so low, snow is well-frozen in certain areas and death by slipping and falling can also occur. High winds at these altitudes on Everest are also a potential threat to climbers. The atmospheric pressure at the top of Everest is about a third of sea level pressure, meaning there is about a third as much oxygen available to breathe as at sea level.^[26]

Bottled oxygen controversy

Most expeditions use oxygen masks and tanks^[27] above 8,000 m (26,246 ft). Everest can be climbed without supplementary oxygen but this increases the risk to the climber. Humans do not think clearly with low oxygen, and the combination of severe weather, low temperatures, and steep slopes often require quick, accurate decisions.
The use of bottled oxygen to ascend Mount Everest has been controversial. George Mallory himself described the use of such oxygen as unsportsmanlike, but he later concluded that it would be impossible to summit without it and consequently used it. When Tenzing and Hillary made the first successful summit in 1953 they used bottled oxygen. For the next twenty-five years, bottled oxygen was considered standard for any successful summit.
Reinhold Messner was the first climber to break the bottled oxygen tradition and in 1978, with Peter Habeler, made the first successful climb without it. Although critics alleged that he sucked mini-bottles of oxygen - a claim that Messner denied - Messner silenced them when he summited the mountain, without supplemental oxygen or support, on the more difficult northwest route, in 1980. In the aftermath of Messner's two successful ascents, the debate on bottled oxygen usage continued.
The aftermath of the 1996 Mount Everest disaster further intensified the debate. Jon Krakauer's ''Into Thin Air'' (1997) expressed the author's personal criticisms of the use of bottled oxygen. Krakauer wrote that the use of bottled oxygen allowed otherwise unqualified climbers to attempt to summit, leading to dangerous situations and more deaths. The May 10 disaster was partially caused by the sheer number of climbers (33 on that day) attempting to ascend, causing bottlenecks at the Hillary Step and delaying many climbers, most of whom summited after the usual 2 p.m. turnaround time. He proposed banning bottled oxygen except for emergency cases, arguing that this would both decrease the growing pollution on Everest—many bottles have accumulated on its slopes—and keep marginally qualified climbers off the mountain.
The 1996 disaster also introduced the issue of the guide's role in using bottled oxygen.^[28]
Guide Anatoli Boukreev's decision not to use bottled oxygen was sharply criticized by Jon Krakauer. Boukreev's supporters (who include G. Weston DeWalt, who co-wrote ''The Climb'') state that using bottled oxygen gives a false sense of security. Krakauer and his supporters point out that, without bottled oxygen, Boukreev was unable to directly help his clients descend.^[29] They state that Boukreev said that he was going down with client Martin Adams, but when Adams slowed down, Boukreev later descended faster and left him behind.

Life-threatening thefts

Other climbers have reported life-threatening thefts from supply caches. Vitor Negrete, the first Brazilian to climb Everest without oxygen and part of David Sharp's party, died during his descent, and theft from his high-altitude camp may have contributed.^[30]
The climbers who left him said that the rescue efforts would be useless and only cause more deaths because of how many people it would have taken to pull him off.

Life forms

''Euophrys omnisuperstes'', a minute black jumping spider, has been found at elevations as high as 6,700 meters, possibly making it the highest confirmed permanent resident on Earth. They lurk in crevices and possibly feed on frozen insects that have been blown there by the wind. It should be noted that there is a high likelihood of microscopic life at even higher altitudes.
Birds, such as the bar-headed goose have been seen flying at the higher altitudes of the mountain, while others such as the Chough have been spotted at high levels on the mountain itself, scavenging on food, or even corpses, left over by climbing expeditions.

See also

★ Highest mountains of the world

★ North Col

★ South Col

★ Rongbuk Glacier

★ Rongbuk Monastery

★ Kangshung Face, Mount Everest

★ Geography of China

★ Sagarmatha National Park

★ Geology of the Himalaya

★ List of deaths on eight-thousanders

Image gallery

External links

★ ''National Geographic'' site on Mt. Everest

★ NOVA site on Mt. Everest

★ Royal Geographical Society site on Mt. Everest

★ Mount Everest panorama, Mount Everest interactive panorama (Quicktime format), Virtual panoramas
★ North
★ South

★ Interactive climb of Everest from Discovery Channel

★ ''Google Maps'' satellite image, Mount Everest Basecamp with ''Google Earth'' (KMZ file)

★ Mount Everest on Summitpost

★ The Rest of Everest video podcast

★ Full list of all 3,050 ascents of Everest to March 2007 (in Excel format)

References

1. Based on elevation of snow cap, not rock head. For more details, see ''Measurement''.
2. The position of the summit of Everest on the international border is clearly shown on detailed topographic mapping, including official Nepalese mapping.
3. The WGS84 coordinates given here were calculated using detailed topographic mapping and are in agreement with adventurestats. They are unlikely to be in error by more than 2". Coordinates showing Everest to be more than a minute further east that appeared on this page until recently, and still appear in Wikipedia in several other languages, are incorrect.
4. http://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/0305/expert_everest.html
5. L. A. Waddell, "The Environs and Native Names of Mount Everest," ''The Geographical Journal'', Vol. 12, No. 6 (Dec. 1898), pp. 564-569. Available at JSTOR.
6. Web Reference
7. Xinhua.net
8. abc.au article
9. ABC.net
10. Alpine Research
11. Nepalese government site
12. www.alpineresearch.ch/alpine/en/presse1.html
13. National Geographic
14. Museum of Science

15. BBC News
16. India and China in warming study
17. The "base" of a mountain is a problematic notion in general with no universally accepted definition. However for a peak rising out of relatively flat terrain, such as Mauna Kea or Denali, an ''approximate'' height above "base" can be calculated. For Everest the situation is more complicated, since it only rises above relatively flat terrain on its north (Tibetan Plateau) side. Hence the concept of "base" has even less meaning for Everest than for Mauna Kea or Denali, and the range of numbers for "height above base" is wider. In general, comparisons based on "height above base" are somewhat suspect.
18. NOVA Online: Surviving Denali, The Mission
19. ''Mount Everest'' (1:50,000 scale map), prepared under the direction of Bradford Washburn for the Boston Museum of Science, the Swiss Foundation for Alpine Research, and the National Geographic Society, 1991, ISBN 3-85515-105-9
20. Xinhua News Agency, June 18, 2007.
21. Tenzing Norgay and James Ramsey Ullman, ''Man of Everest'' (1955, also
published as ''Tiger of the Snows'')
22.
The day the sky fell on Everest, , , , New Scientist,

23.
High winds suck oxygen from Everest Predicting pressure lows could protect climbers.

24. Eurocopter Everest page (pictures)
25. Federation Aeronautique Internationale records page. (Search for "Everest" on this page).
26. Online high altitude oxygen calculator
27. Mountainzone article.
28. The debate between G. Weston DeWalt and Jon Krakauer on bottled oxygen and Boukreev's actions can be found in the Salon debates
29. Coming Down page 3 DWIGHT GARNER ''salon.com'' 1998 August
30. Mounteverest.net article. See also second article.


★ Summits and deaths per year

★ ''American Alpine Journal'' 2005, p. 393.

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