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Edmund Hillary Mount Everest
Sir Edmund Percival Hillary  (20 July 1919 – 11 January 2008) was a New Zealand mountaineer, explorer and philanthropist. On 29 May 1953, Hillary and Nepalese Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers to reach the summit of Mount Everest. They were part of the ninth British expedition to Everest, led by John Hunt. Hillary was named by Time as one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.

Hillary became interested in mountaineering while in secondary school, making his first major climb in 1939, reaching the summit of Mount Ollivier. He served in the Royal New Zealand Air Force as a navigator during World War II. Prior to the 1953 Everest expedition, Hillary had been part of the British reconnaissance expedition to the mountain in 1951, as well as an unsuccessful attempt to climb Cho Oyu in 1952. As part of the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition he reached the South Pole overland in 1958. He subsequently reached the North Pole, making him the first person to reach both poles and summit Everest.

Following his ascent of Everest, Hillary devoted most of his life to helping the Sherpa people of Nepal through the Himalayan Trust, which he founded. Through his efforts, many schools and hospitals were built in Nepal.

Early life

Hillary was born to Percival Augustus and Gertrude (née Clark) Hillary in Auckland, New Zealand, on 20 July 1919.  His family moved to Tuakau (south of Auckland) in 1920, after his father (who served at Gallipoli in the 15th North Auckland) was allocated land there.[http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/culture/edmund-hillary/early-years The early years – Ed Hillary], [http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/ New Zealand History online – Nga korero aipurangi o Aotearoa], Ministry for Culture and Heritage, Wellington, New Zealand. Updated 11 January 2008. Retrieved 12 January 2008. His grandparents were early settlers in northern Wairoa in the mid-19th century after emigrating from Yorkshire, England. 

Hillary was educated at Tuakau Primary School and then Auckland Grammar School. He finished primary school two years early and at high school achieved average marks.  He was initially smaller than his peers there and very shy so he took refuge in his books and daydreams of a life filled with adventure. His daily train journey to and from high school was over two hours each way, during which he regularly used the time to read. He gained confidence after he learned to box. At 16 his interest in climbing was sparked during a school trip to Mount Ruapehu. Though gangly at 6 ft 5 in (195 cm) and uncoordinated, he found that he was physically strong and had greater endurance than many of his tramping companions.[http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article3170995.ece Hillary mourned, both in Nepal and New Zealand] Timesonline.co.uk dated 11 January 2008. Retrieved 12 January 2008
He studied mathematics and science at the Auckland University College, and in 1939 completed his first major climb, reaching the summit of Mount Ollivier, near Aoraki/Mount Cook in the Southern Alps.
With his brother Rex, Hillary became a beekeeper, a summer occupation that allowed him to pursue climbing in the winter. He joined the Radiant Living Tramping Club, where a holistic health philosophy developed by the health advocate Herbert Sutcliffe was taught. Hillary developed his love for the outdoors on tours with the club through the Waitakere Ranges. 

His interest in beekeeping later led Hillary to commission Michael Ayrton to cast a golden sculpture in the shape of honeycomb in imitation of Daedalus's lost-wax process. This was placed in his New Zealand garden, where his bees took it over as a hive and "filled it with honey and their young". 

World War II

Upon the outbreak of World War II Hillary applied to join the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF), but withdrew the application before it was considered because he was "harassed by [his] religious conscience".  In 1943 the Japanese threat in the Pacific and the arrival of conscription finally undermined his pacifist inclination and Hillary joined the RNZAF as a navigator serving in No. 6 Squadron RNZAF and then No. 5 Squadron RNZAF  on Catalina flying boats. In 1945 he was sent to Fiji and to the Solomon Islands, where he was badly burnt in a boat accident and repatriated to New Zealand.

Expeditions

Harry Ayres, along with Mick Sullivan, led Hillary and Ruth Adams up the south ridge of Aoraki/Mount Cook, New Zealand's highest peak, on 30 January 1948. 

Hillary was part of a British reconnaissance expedition to Everest in 1951 led by Eric Shipton before joining the successful British attempt of 1953.

In 1952 Hillary and George Lowe were part of the British team led by Eric Shipton that attempted Cho Oyu.  After that attempt failed due to the lack of route from the Nepal side, Hillary and Lowe crossed the Nup La into Tibet and reached the old Camp II, on the northern side, where all the pre-war expeditions camped. 

1953 Everest expedition

The route to Everest was closed by Chinese-controlled Tibet, and Nepal only allowed one expedition per year. A Swiss expedition (in which Tenzing took part) had attempted to reach the summit in 1952 but was turned back by bad weather and exhaustion 800 ft from the summit. During a 1952 trip in the Alps, Hillary discovered that he and his friend George Lowe had been invited by the Joint Himalayan Committee for the approved British 1953 attempt and immediately accepted. 

Shipton was named as leader but was replaced by Hunt. Hillary considered pulling out, but both Hunt and Shipton talked him into remaining. Hillary was intending to climb with Lowe but Hunt named two teams for the assault: Tom Bourdillon and Charles Evans; and Hillary and Tenzing. Hillary therefore made a concerted effort to forge a working friendship with Tenzing.

The Hunt expedition totalled over 400 people, including 362 porters, twenty Sherpa guides and 10,000 lbs of baggage,[http://www.guardian.co.uk/fromthearchive/story/0,,966102,00.html Hillary of New Zealand and Tenzing reach the top], Reuter (in The Guardian, 2 June 1953) and like many such expeditions, was a team effort. Lowe supervised the preparation of the Lhotse Face, a huge and steep ice face, for climbing. Hillary forged a route through the treacherous Khumbu Icefall.

The expedition set up base camp in March 1953. Working slowly it set up its final camp at the South Col at 25900 ft. On 26 May Bourdillon and Evans attempted the climb but turned back when Evans' oxygen system failed. The pair had reached the South Summit, coming within 300 vertical feet (91 m) of the summit.[http://www.unlockingthearchives.rgs.org/resources/documents/Reaching%20the%20Top3.pdf Reaching The Top] Royal Geographical Society. Retrieved 13 January 2008. Hunt then directed Hillary and Tenzing to go for the summit.

Snow and wind held the pair up at the South Col for two days. They set out on 28 May with a support trio of Lowe, Alfred Gregory and Ang Nyima. The two pitched a tent at 27900 ft on 28 May while their support group returned down the mountain. On the following morning Hillary discovered that his boots had frozen solid outside the tent. He spent two hours warming them before he and Tenzing attempted the final ascent wearing 30 lb packs. The crucial move of the last part of the ascent was the 40-foot (12 m) rock face later named the "Hillary Step". Hillary saw a means to wedge his way up a crack in the face between the rock wall and the ice and Tenzing followed.  From there the following effort was relatively simple. Hillary reported that both men reached the summit at the same time, but in "The Dream Comes True," Tenzing Norgay said that Hillary had indeed taken the first step atop Mount Everest. They reached Everest's 29,028 ft (8,848 m) summit, the highest point on earth, at 11:30 am.  As Hillary put it, "A few more whacks of the ice axe in the firm snow, and we stood on top."PBS, NOVA, [http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/everest/history/firstsummit2.html First to Summit], Updated November 2000. Retrieved 31 March 2007.

They spent only about 15 minutes at the summit. Hillary took the famous photo of Tenzing posing with his ice-axe, but since Tenzing had never used a camera, Hillary's ascent went unrecorded.  However, according to Tenzing's autobiography Man of Everest, when Tenzing offered to take Hillary's photograph Hillary declined: "I motioned to Hillary that I would now take his picture. But for some reason he shook his head; he did not want it." Tenzing left chocolates in the snow as an offering and Hillary left a cross that he had been given by John Hunt.  Additional photos were taken looking down the mountain in order to confirm that they had made it to the top and that the ascent was not faked. 

The two had to take care on the descent after discovering that drifting snow had covered their tracks, complicating the task of retracing their steps. The first person they met was Lowe, who had climbed up to meet them with hot soup.

News of the expedition reached Britain on the day of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, and the press called the successful ascent a coronation gift.  In return, the 37 members of the party received the Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Medal with MOUNT EVEREST EXPEDITION engraved on the rim. The group was surprised by the international acclaim that they received upon arriving in Kathmandu.
Hillary and Hunt were knighted by the young queen, while Tenzing – ineligible for knighthood as a Nepalese citizen – received the George Medal from the British Government for his efforts with the expedition.  

After Everest

Hillary climbed ten other peaks in the Himalayas on further visits in 1956, 1960–1961, and 1963–1965. He also reached the South Pole as part of the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition, for which he led the New Zealand section, on 4 January 1958. His party was the first to reach the Pole overland since Amundsen in 1911 and Scott in 1912, and the first ever to do so using motor vehicles.

Hillary narrowly missed becoming a victim in TWA Flight 266 from the American midwest in the 1960 New York air disaster, having been late for his flight. 

In the summer of 1962, he was a guest on the television show What's My Line?. The panellists were blindfolded for his appearance. He stumped the panel, Dorothy Kilgallen, guest panelist Merv Griffin, Arlene Francis, and Bennett Cerf. 

In 1977, he led a jetboat expedition, titled "Ocean to Sky", from the mouth of the Ganges River to its source. Between 1977 and 1979, Hillary commentated aboard several Antarctic sightseeing flights operated by Air New Zealand.  He was scheduled to commentate on 28 November 1979 Air New Zealand Flight 901, but had to pull out due to work commitments in the United States, and was replaced by his close friend Peter Mulgrew. The aircraft crashed into Mount Erebus in Antarctica, killing all 257 on board.  Hillary later married Mulgrew's widow.  

Hillary took part in the 1975 general election, as a member of the "Citizens for Rowling" campaign. His involvement in this campaign was seen as precluding his nomination as Governor-General,Rowling: The man and the myth by John Henderson, Australia New Zealand Press, 1980. with the position instead being offered to Keith Holyoake in 1977. However, in 1985 he was appointed New Zealand High Commissioner to India (concurrently High Commissioner to Bangladesh and Ambassador to Nepal) and spent four and a half years based in New Delhi. In 1985 he accompanied Neil Armstrong in a small twin-engined ski plane over the Arctic Ocean and landed at the North Pole. He thus became the first man to stand at both poles and on the summit of Everest.    

Hillary was highly critical of a decision not to try to rescue David Sharp, an Everest climber who died on the mountain in 2006, saying that leaving other climbers to die is unacceptable, and the desire to get to the summit has become all-important. He also said, "I think the whole attitude towards climbing Mount Everest has become rather horrifying. The people just want to get to the top. It was wrong if there was a man suffering altitude problems and was huddled under a rock, just to lift your hat, say good morning and pass on by". He also told the New Zealand Herald that he was horrified by the callous attitude of today's climbers. "They don't give a damn for anybody else who may be in distress and it doesn't impress me at all that they leave someone lying under a rock to die" and that, "I think that their priority was to get to the top and the welfare of ... a member of an expedition was very secondary." 

Australian mountaineer Adam Darragh in turn considered Hillary's criticism of Russell Brice (expedition leader) and his team as too harsh,  and Mark Inglis himself, while maintaining that he remained on good terms with Hillary after the incident,  noted that Sharp was "almost frozen solid" and "effectively dead" when the team found him in the difficult terrain on their descent. 

In January 2007, Hillary travelled to Antarctica to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the founding of Scott Base. He flew to the station on 18 January 2007 with a delegation including the Prime Minister.    While there he called for the British government to contribute to the upkeep of Scott's and Shackleton's huts. 

On 22 April 2007 while on a trip to Kathmandu he was reported to have suffered a fall. There was no comment on the nature of his illness and he did not immediately seek treatment. He was hospitalised after returning to New Zealand. 

Public recognition

On 6 June 1953 Hillary was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire and received the Queen Elizabeth II Coronation Medal the same year; and on 6 February 1987 was the fourth appointee to the Order of New Zealand."The Order of New Zealand" (12 February 1987) 20 New Zealand Gazette 705 at 709. On 22 April 1995 Hillary was appointed Knight Companion of The Most Noble Order of the Garter.   The Government of India conferred on him its second highest civilian award, the Padma Vibhushan, posthumously, in 2008.  He was also awarded the Polar Medal in 1958 for his part in the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition,   and the Order of Gorkha Dakshina Bahu, 1st Class of the Kingdom of Nepal in 1953 and the Coronation Medal in 1975.  His favoured New Zealand charity was the Sir Edmund Hillary Outdoor Pursuits Centre Inc. (OPC) of which he was Patron for 35 years. Hillary was particularly keen on the work this organisation did in introducing young New Zealanders to the outdoors in a very similar way to his first experience of a school trip to Mt Ruapehu at the age of 16. Various streets, schools and organisations around New Zealand and abroad are named after him. A few examples are Hillary College (Otara), Edmund Hillary Primary School (Papakura) and the Hillary Commission (now SPARC). Several schools have houses named after him, including Auckland Grammar School, Edgecumbe College, Hutt International Boys' School, Macleans College, Rangiora High School, Tauranga Boys' College, Upper Hutt College, Sacred Heart RC Primary School, Anglican Church Grammar School, Hornsby House School, and Endeavour Primary School.

In 1992 Hillary appeared on the updated New Zealand $5 note, thus making him the only New Zealander to appear on a banknote during his or her lifetime, in defiance of the established convention for banknotes of using only depictions of deceased individuals, and current heads of state. The Reserve Bank governor at the time, Don Brash, had originally intended to use a deceased sportsperson on the $5 note but could not find a suitable candidate. Instead he broke with convention by requesting and receiving Hillary's permission – along with an insistence from Hillary to use Aoraki/Mount Cook rather than Mount Everest in the backdrop. The image also features a Ferguson TE20 tractor like the one Hillary used to reach the South Pole on the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition. A  bronze statue of "Sir Ed" was installed outside The Hermitage hotel at Mount Cook Village, New Zealand, in 2003.

On 17 June 2004 Hillary was awarded Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland. 

To mark the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the first successful ascent of Everest the Nepalese government conferred honorary citizenship upon Hillary at a special Golden Jubilee celebration in Kathmandu, Nepal. He was the first foreign national to receive that honour. 

In 2005 a poll conducted by Reader's Digest put Hillary as "New Zealand's most trusted individual", beating cyclist Sarah Ulmer and film director Peter Jackson.  He kept the title in 2006 and 2007  After his death in 2008 he was succeeded by Willie Apiata VC, a Corporal in the NZSAS. 

Two Antarctic features are named after Hillary. The Hillary Coast is a section of coastline south of Ross Island and north of the Shackleton Coast. It is formally recognised by New Zealand, the United States of America and Russia. The Hillary Canyon, an undersea feature in the Ross Sea appears on the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans, which is published by the International Hydrographic Organization. 

In 1974, Folkways Records released Interview with Sir Edmund Hillary: Mountain Climbing which included his thoughts on the Everest Expedition and the Abominable Snowman.

Personal life

Hillary married Louise Mary Rose on 3 September 1953, soon after the ascent of Everest. A shy man, he relied on his future mother-in-law to propose on his behalf.  They had three children: Peter (born 1954), Sarah (born 1955) and Belinda (1959–1975). 
In 1975 while en route to join Hillary in the village of Phaphlu, where he was helping to build a hospital, Louise and Belinda were killed in a plane crash near Kathmandu airport shortly after take-off. 
In 1989 he married June Mulgrew, the widow of his close friend Peter Mulgrew, who died having replaced Hillary as speaker on Air New Zealand Flight 901, a sightseeing flight to the Antarctic which crashed into Mount Erebus in 1979.  
His son Peter Hillary has also become a climber, summiting Everest in 1990. In May 2002 Peter climbed Everest as part of a 50th anniversary celebration; Jamling Tenzing Norgay (son of Tenzing; Tenzing himself had died in 1986) was also part of the expedition.  Hillary had six grandchildren.

He spent most of his life (when not away on expeditions) living in a property on Remuera Road in Auckland City,  where he enjoyed reading adventure and science fiction novels in his retirement.

Hillary also built a bach at Whites Beach,  one of Auckland's west coast beaches in the former Waitakere City, between Anawhata and North Piha.   Bob Harvey, mayor of Waitakere,  and friend of Hillary from the early 1970s, said that "the West Coast was Sir Ed's second home. Anawhata was his favourite beach; a place he called the most beautiful on the planet."  Harvey said that the bach was Hillary's place of solace, where he would go when the media attention became too much – including after his return from conquering Everest. "Building the cottage at Whites Beach – he told me – was one of his greatest pleasures." Aside from the bach, Hillary also co-owned a large piece of land in Karekare Valley in the 1970s with fellow climber Mike Gill.

The Hillary family has had a connection with the West Coast of Auckland since 1925, when Hillary's father-in-law, Jim Rose, built a bach at Anawhata.  The family donated land at Whites Beach that is now crossed by trampers on the Hillary Trail, named for Edmund (see Tributes, below).

Philanthropy

Following his ascent of Everest he devoted much of his life to helping the Sherpa people of Nepal through the Himalayan Trust, which he founded in 1960  and led until his death in 2008. Through his efforts many schools and hospitals were built in this remote region of the Himalayas. He was the Honorary President of the American Himalayan Foundation, a United States non-profit body that helps improve the ecology and living conditions in the Himalayas. He was also the Honorary President of Mountain Wilderness, an international NGO dedicated to the worldwide protection of mountains.

Political Involvement

As at 1975, Hillary served as a Vice President for the Abortion Law Reform Association of New Zealand. The Association is New Zealand's national pro-choice advocacy group which was founded in 1971.  As at 1978, he was a patron of REPEAL, a New Zealand-wide organisation that sought to repeal the Contraception, Sterilization, and Abortion Act 1977. The organization collected 319,000 signatures for a petition that demanded the law be overturned. 

Death

On 11 January 2008, Hillary died of heart failure at the Auckland City Hospital at around 9 am NZDT (10 January at 20:00 UTC) at the age of 88. 
Hillary's death was announced by New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark at around 11:20 am. She stated that his death was a "profound loss to New Zealand".  His death was recognised by the lowering of flags to half-mast on all Government and public buildings and at Scott Base in Antarctica.  Actor and adventurer Brian Blessed, who attempted to climb Everest three times, described Sir Edmund as a "kind of titan". He was in hospital at the time of his death but was expected to come home that day according to his family.     

After Hillary's death the Green Party proposed a new public holiday for 20 July or the Monday nearest to it.  Renaming mountains after Hillary was also proposed. The Mt Cook Village's Hermitage Hotel, the Sir Edmund Hillary Alpine Centre and Alpine Guides, proposed a renaming of Mount Ollivier, the first mountain climbed by Hillary. The family of Arthur Ollivier, for whom the mountain is named, are against such a renaming. 

Funeral

A state funeral was held for Hillary on 22 January 2008,  after which his body was cremated. The first part of this funeral was on 21 January when Hillary's casket was taken into Holy Trinity Cathedral to lie in state.  On 29 February 2008, in a private ceremony, most of Hillary's ashes were scattered in Auckland's Hauraki Gulf as he had desired.  The remainder went to a Nepalese monastery near Everest; a plan to scatter them on the summit was cancelled in 2010. 

On 2 April 2008, a service of thanksgiving was held in his honour at St George's Chapel in Windsor Castle. It was attended by the Queen (but not the Duke of Edinburgh owing to a chest infection) and New Zealand dignitaries including Prime Minister Helen Clark. Sir Edmund's family and family members of Tenzing Norgay attended as well. Gurkha soldiers from Nepal, a country Sir Edmund Hillary held much affection for, stood guard outside the ceremony.  

On 5 November 2008, a commemorative set of five stamps was issued. 

Tributes

There have been many calls for lasting tributes to Sir Edmund Hillary. The first major public tribute has been by way of the "Summits for Ed" tribute tour organised by the Sir Edmund Hillary foundation.  This tribute tour went from Bluff at the bottom of the South Island to Cape Reinga at the tip of the North Island, visiting 39 towns and cities along the way. In each venue school children and members of the public were invited to join together to climb a significant hill or site in their area to show their respect for Hillary. Public were also invited to bring small rocks or pebbles that had special significance to them, that would be collected and included in a memorial to Hillary at the base of Mt Ruapehu in the grounds of the Sir Edmund Hillary Outdoor Pursuits Centre. Any funds donated during the tour are to be used by the foundation to sponsor young New Zealanders on outdoor courses to continue the values that Hillary espoused. Over 8,000 members of the public attended these "Summit" climbs between March and May 2008. 

In January 2008, Lukla Airport, in Lukla, Nepal, was renamed to Tenzing-Hillary Airport in honour of Sir Edmund and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, for their efforts in the construction of the airport. 

On 23 October 2008, it was announced that all future England vs New Zealand rugby test matches will be played for the Hillary Shield named in honour of Sir Edmund. The shield was contested for the first time on 29 November 2008 at Twickenham Stadium, and was presented to the winning team, the New Zealand national rugby union team, by Lady Hillary.  Also on 23 October 2008 the Duke of Edinburgh's Award in New Zealand (formerly the Young New Zealanders' Challenge) was announced as the youth programme that would take Sir Edmund's name as part of its brand (at the request of the NZ Govt and the Hillary family). The organisation re-branded on 20 August 2009 as "The Duke of Edinburgh's Hillary Award". 

On 11 January 2009 at 9 am the New Zealand duo, "The Kiwis", performed their tribute song "Hillary 88" in front of the Beehive in Wellington. This has been recorded as the official world memorial song for Sir Edmund Hillary with the endorsement of Lady Hillary. The band members were Dean Ward and George Watson of Levin. 

A four-day track in the Waitakere Ranges, along Auckland's west coast, is named the Hillary Trail,  in honour of Sir Edmund. Hillary's father-in-law, Jim Rose, who had built a bach at Anawhata in 1925, wrote "My family look forward to the time when we will be able to walk from Huia to Muriwai on public walking tracks like the old-time Maori could do" in his 1982 history of Anawhata Beach.  Hillary loved the area, and had his own bach near Anawhata (see Personal life, above). He and his friend, former mayor Bob Harvey, kept Rose's dream alive, and the track was eventually opened on 11 January 2010, the second anniversary of Hillary's death.  Rose Track, descending from Anawhata Road to Whites Beach, is named after the Rose family. 

The South Ridge of Aoraki/Mount Cook, New Zealand's highest mountain, was renamed Hillary Ridge on 18 August 2011. Hillary and three other climbers were the first party to successfully climb the ridge in 1948.  In September 2013 the Government of Nepal proposed naming a 7681 m mountain in Nepal Hillary Peak in his honour.  After the New Horizons mission discovered a mountain range on Pluto on 14 July 2015, it was informally named Hillary Montes (Hillary Mountains) by NASA. 

Legacy 

*A bronze bust of Hillary (circa 1953) by Ophelia Gordon Bell is in the Te Papa museum in Wellington, New Zealand. 
*Hillary Montes, the second-highest mountain range on Pluto, is named in honor of Edmund Hillary.
*The Sir Edmund Hillary Archive was added to the UNESCO Memory of the world archive in 2013,  it is currently held by the Auckland War Memorial Museum 

Arms

Publications

Books written by Hillary include:
*High Adventure (1955), Hodder & Stoughton (London) (reprinted Oxford University Press (paperback) ISBN 1-932302-02-6 and as High Adventure: The True Story of the First Ascent of Everest ISBN 0-19-516734-1)
*East of Everest — An Account of the New Zealand Alpine Club Himalayan Expedition to the Barun Valley in 1954, with George Lowe (1956), E. P. Dutton and Company, Inc. ASIN B000EW84UM
*No Latitude for Error (1961), Hodder & Stoughton. ASIN B000H6UVP6.
*The New Zealand Antarctic Expedition (1959), R.W. Stiles, printers. ASIN B0007K6D72.
*The Crossing of Antarctica; the Commonwealth Transantarctic Expedition, 1955–1958 with Sir Vivian Fuchs (1958). Cassell ASIN B000HJGZ08
*High in the thin cold air; the story of the Himalayan Expedition, led by Sir Edmund Hillary, sponsored by World Book Encyclopedia, with Desmond Doig (1963) ASIN B00005W121
*Schoolhouse in the Clouds (1965); ASIN B00005WRBB
*Nothing Venture, Nothing Win (1975) Hodder & Stoughton General Division; ISBN 0-340-21296-9
*From the Ocean to the Sky: Jet Boating Up the Ganges Ulverscroft Large Print Books Ltd (November 1980); ISBN 0-7089-0587-0
*Two Generations with Peter Hillary (1984) Hodder & Stoughton Ltd; ISBN 0-340-35420-8
*Ascent: Two Lives Explored: The Autobiographies of Sir Edmund and Peter Hillary (1992) Paragon House Publishers ISBN 1-55778-408-6
*View from the Summit: The Remarkable Memoir by the First Person to Conquer Everest (2000) Pocket; ISBN 0-7434-0067-4

= Mount Everest, also known in Nepal as Sagarmāthā and in Tibet as Chomolungma, is Earth's highest mountain. It is located in the Mahalangur mountain range in Nepal and Tibet.   Its peak is 8848 m above sea level. The international border between China (Tibet Autonomous Region) and Nepal runs across Everest's precise summit point. Its massif includes neighbouring peaks Lhotse, 8516 m; Nuptse, 7855 m and Changtse, 7580 m.

In 1856, the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India established the first published height of Everest, then known as Peak XV, at 29002 ft. The current official height of 8848 m as recognised by China and Nepal was established by a 1955 Indian survey and subsequently confirmed by a Chinese survey in 1975. In 1865, Everest was given its official English name by the Royal Geographical Society upon a recommendation by Andrew Waugh, the British Surveyor General of India. As there appeared to be several different local names, Waugh chose to name the mountain after his predecessor in the post, Sir George Everest, despite George Everest's objections. 

Mount Everest attracts many climbers, some of them highly experienced mountaineers. There are two main climbing routes: one approaching the summit from the southeast in Nepal (known as the standard route) and the other from the north in Tibet. While not posing substantial technical climbing challenges on the standard route, Everest presents dangers such as altitude sickness, weather, wind as well as significant objective hazards from avalanches and the Khumbu Icefall. As of 2016, there are well over 200 corpses still on the mountain, with some of them even serving as landmarks.  

The first recorded efforts to reach Everest's summit were made by British mountaineers. With Nepal not allowing foreigners into the country at the time, the British made several attempts on the north ridge route from the Tibetan side. After the first reconnaissance expedition by the British in 1921 reached 7000 m on the North Col, the 1922 expedition pushed the North ridge route up to 8320 m marking the first time a human had climbed above 8000 m. Tragedy struck on the descent from the North col when seven porters were killed in an avalanche. The 1924 expedition resulted in the greatest mystery on Everest to this day: George Mallory and Andrew Irvine made a final summit attempt on 8 June but never returned, sparking debate as to whether they were the first to reach the top. They had been spotted high on the mountain that day but disappeared in the clouds, never to be seen again, until Mallory's body was found in 1999 at 8155 m on the North face. Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary made the first official ascent of Everest in 1953 using the southeast ridge route. Tenzing had reached 8595 m the previous year as a member of the 1952 Swiss expedition. The Chinese mountaineering team of Wang Fuzhou, Gonpo and Qu Yinhua made the first reported ascent of the peak from the North Ridge on 25 May 1960.

Western discovery

In 1802, the British began the Great Trigonometric Survey of India to determine the location and names of the world's highest mountains. Starting in southern India, the survey teams moved northward using giant theodolites, each weighing 500 kg and requiring 12 men to carry, to measure heights as accurately as possible. They reached the Himalayan foothills by the 1830s, but Nepal was unwilling to allow the British to enter the country because of suspicions of political aggression and possible annexation. Several requests by the surveyors to enter Nepal were turned down.

The British were forced to continue their observations from Terai, a region south of Nepal which is parallel to the Himalayas. Conditions in Terai were difficult because of torrential rains and malaria. Three survey officers died from malaria while two others had to retire because of failing health.

Nonetheless, in 1847, the British continued the Great Trigonometric survey and began detailed observations of the Himalayan peaks from observation stations up to 240 km away. Weather restricted work to the last three months of the year. In November 1847, Andrew Waugh, the British Surveyor General of India made several observations from the Sawajpore station located in the eastern end of the Himalayas. Kangchenjunga was then considered the highest peak in the world, and with interest he noted a peak beyond it, about 230 km away. John Armstrong, one of Waugh's officials, also saw the peak from a location farther west and called it peak "b". Waugh would later write that the observations indicated that peak "b" was higher than Kangchenjunga, but given the great distance of the observations, closer observations were required for verification. The following year, Waugh sent a survey official back to Terai to make closer observations of peak "b", but clouds thwarted all attempts.

In 1849, Waugh dispatched James Nicolson to the area, who made two observations from Jirol, 190 km away. Nicolson then took the largest theodolite and headed east, obtaining over 30 observations from five different locations, with the closest being 174 km from the peak.

Nicolson retreated to Patna on the Ganges to perform the necessary calculations based on his observations. His raw data gave an average height of 9200 m for peak "b", but this did not consider light refraction, which distorts heights. However, the number clearly indicated that peak "b" was higher than Kangchenjunga. Then, Nicolson contracted malaria and was forced to return home without finishing his calculations. Michael Hennessy, one of Waugh's assistants, had begun designating peaks based on Roman numerals, with Kangchenjunga named Peak IX, while peak "b" now became known as Peak XV.

In 1852, stationed at the survey headquarters in Dehradun, Radhanath Sikdar, an Indian mathematician and surveyor from Bengal, was the first to identify Everest as the world's highest peak, using trigonometric calculations based on Nicolson's measurements. An official announcement that Peak XV was the highest was delayed for several years as the calculations were repeatedly verified. Waugh began work on Nicolson's data in 1854, and along with his staff spent almost two years working on the calculations, having to deal with the problems of light refraction, barometric pressure, and temperature over the vast distances of the observations. Finally, in March 1856 he announced his findings in a letter to his deputy in Calcutta. Kangchenjunga was declared to be 28156 ft, while Peak XV was given the height of 29002 ft. Waugh concluded that Peak XV was "most probably the highest in the world". Peak XV (measured in feet) was calculated to be exactly 29000 ft high, but was publicly declared to be 29002 ft in order to avoid the impression that an exact height of 29000 ft was nothing more than a rounded estimate. Waugh is therefore wittily credited with being "the first person to put two feet on top of Mount Everest".

Name

 
While the survey wanted to preserve local names if possible (e.g. Kangchenjunga and Dhaulagiri), Waugh argued that he could not find any commonly used local name. Waugh's search for a local name was hampered by Nepal and Tibet's exclusion of foreigners. Many local names existed, including "Deodungha" ("Holy Mountain") in Darjeeling  and the Tibetan "Chomolungma", which appeared on a 1733 map published in Paris by the French geographer D'Anville. In the late 19th century, many European cartographers incorrectly believed that a native name for the mountain was Gaurishankar, which is a mountain between Kathmandu and Everest. 

Waugh argued that because there were many local names, it would be difficult to favour one name over all others, so he decided that Peak XV should be named after Welsh surveyor Sir George Everest, his predecessor as Surveyor General of India.   Everest himself opposed the name suggested by Waugh and told the Royal Geographical Society in 1857 that "Everest" could not be written in Hindi nor pronounced by "the native of India". Waugh's proposed name prevailed despite the objections, and in 1865, the Royal Geographical Society officially adopted Mount Everest as the name for the highest mountain in the world. The modern pronunciations of Everest ( and)  are different from Sir George's pronunciation of his surname (, ). 

The Tibetan name for Mount Everest is  (, lit. "Holy Mother"), whose official Tibetan pinyin form is Qomolangma. It is also popularly romanised as Chomolungma and (in Wylie) as Jo-mo-glang-ma or Jomo Langma. The official Chinese transcription is   whose pinyin form is Zhūmùlǎngmǎ Fēng ("Chomolungma Peak").  It is also infrequently simply translated into Chinese as Shèngmǔ Fēng   lit. "Holy Mother Peak"). In 2002, the Chinese People's Daily newspaper published an article making a case against the use of "Mount Everest" in English, insisting that the mountain should be referred to as "Mount Qomolangma", based on the official form of the local Tibetan name. The article argued that British colonialists did not "first discover" the mountain, as it had been known to the Tibetans and mapped by the Chinese as "Qomolangma" since at least 1719. 

In the early 1960s, the Nepalese government coined a Nepali name for Mount Everest, Sagarmāthā or Sagar-Matha  (सागर-मथ्था),  allegedly to supplant the Tibetan name among the locals, a usage which the Nepali government felt was "not acceptable".

Surveys

The 8848 m height given is officially recognised by Nepal and China,  although Nepal is planning a new survey. 

In 1856, Andrew Waugh announced Everest (then known as Peak XV) as 29002 ft high, after several years of calculations based on observations made by the Great Trigonometric Survey.

The elevation of 8848 m 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 of . 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 8850 m, and a snow/ice elevation 1 m higher, were obtained via this device.  Although it has not been officially recognised by Nepal,  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.

On 9 October 2005, after several months of measurement and calculation, the Chinese Academy of Sciences and State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping officially announced the height of Everest as  with accuracy of ±. They claimed it was the most accurate and precise measurement to date.  This height is based on the actual highest point of rock and not on the snow and ice covering it. The Chinese team also measured a snow/ice depth of , which is in agreement with a net elevation of 8848 m. The snow and ice thickness varies over time, making a definitive height of the snow cap impossible to determine.

It is thought that the plate tectonics of the area are adding to the height and moving the summit northeastwards. Two accounts suggest the rates of change are 4 mm per year (upwards) and 3 to per year (northeastwards),  but another account mentions more lateral movement (27 mm), 
and even shrinkage has been suggested. 

Comparisons

The summit of Everest is the point at which Earth's surface reaches 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;  it rises over 10200 m when measured from its base on the mid-ocean floor, but only attains 4205 m above sea level.

By the same measure of base to summit, Denali, in Alaska, formerly known as Mount McKinley, is also taller than Everest. Despite its height above sea level of only 6190 m, Denali sits atop a sloping plain with elevations from 300 to, yielding a height above base in the range of 5300 to; a commonly quoted figure is 5600 m.   By comparison, reasonable base elevations for Everest range from 4200 m on the south side to 5200 m on the Tibetan Plateau, yielding a height above base in the range of 3650 to. 

The summit of Chimborazo in Ecuador is 2168 m farther from Earth's centre () than that of Everest (), because Earth bulges at the Equator.  This is despite Chimborazo having a peak 6268 m above sea level versus Mount Everest's 8848 m.

Geology

Geologists have subdivided the rocks comprising Mount Everest into three units called formations.   Each formation is separated from the other by low-angle faults, called detachments, along which they have been thrust southward over each other. From the summit of Mount Everest to its base these rock units are the Qomolangma Formation, the North Col Formation, and the Rongbuk Formation.

The Qomolangma Formation, also known as the Jolmo Lungama Formation or the Everest Formation,  runs from the summit to the top of the Yellow Band, about  above sea level. It consists of grayish to dark gray or white, parallel laminated and bedded, Ordovician limestone inter layered with subordinate beds of recrystallised dolomite with argillaceous laminae and siltstone. Gansser first reported finding microscopic fragments of crinoids in this limestone.   Later petrographic analysis of samples of the limestone from near the summit revealed them to be composed of carbonate pellets and finely fragmented remains of trilobites, crinoids, and ostracods. Other samples were so badly sheared and recrystallised that their original constituents could not be determined. A thick, white-weathering thrombolite bed that is 60 m thick comprises the foot of the "Third Step", and base of the summit pyramid of Everest. This bed, which crops out starting about 70 m below the summit of Mount Everest, consists of sediments trapped, bound, and cemented by the biofilms of micro-organisms, especially cyanobacteria, in shallow marine waters. The Qomolangma Formation is broken up by several high-angle faults that terminate at the low angle normal fault, the Qomolangma Detachment. This detachment separates it from the underlying Yellow Band. The lower five meters of the Qomolangma Formation overlying this detachment are very highly deformed. 

The bulk of Mount Everest, between , consists of the North Col Formation, of which the Yellow Band forms its upper part between . The Yellow Band consists of intercalated beds of Middle Cambrian diopside-epidote-bearing marble, which weathers a distinctive yellowish brown, and muscovite-biotite phyllite and semischist. Petrographic analysis of marble collected from about  found it to consist as much as five percent of the ghosts of recrystallised crinoid ossicles. The upper five meters of the Yellow Band lying adjacent to the Qomolangma Detachment is badly deformed. A 5 – thick fault breccia separates it from the overlying Qomolangma Formation.

The remainder of the North Col Formation, exposed between  on Mount Everest, consists of interlayered and deformed schist, phyllite, and minor marble. Between , the North Col Formation consists chiefly of biotite-quartz phyllite and chlorite-biotite phyllite intercalated with minor amounts of biotite-sericite-quartz schist. Between , the lower part of the North Col Formation consists of biotite-quartz schist intercalated with epidote-quartz schist, biotite-calcite-quartz schist, and thin layers of quartzose marble. These metamorphic rocks appear to be the result of the metamorphism of Middle to Early Cambrian deep sea flysch composed of interbedded, mudstone, shale, clayey sandstone, calcareous sandstone, graywacke, and sandy limestone. The base of the North Col Formation is a regional low-angle normal fault called the "Lhotse detachment".

Below 7,000 m (23,000 ft), the Rongbuk Formation underlies the North Col Formation and forms the base of Mount Everest. It consists of sillimanite-K-feldspar grade schist and gneiss intruded by numerous sills and dikes of leucogranite ranging in thickness from 1 cm to 1,500 m (0.4 in to 4,900 ft).  These leucogranites are part of a belt of Late Oligocene–Miocene intrusive rocks known as the Higher Himalayan leucogranite. They formed as the result of partial melting of Paleoproterozoic to Ordovician high-grade metasedimentary rocks of the Higher Himalayan Sequence about 20 to 24 million years ago during the subduction of the Indian Plate. 

Mount Everest consists of sedimentary and metamorphic rocks that have been faulted southward over continental crust composed of Archean granulites of the Indian Plate during the Cenozoic collision of India with Asia.
  
    Current interpretations argue that the Qomolangma and North Col formations consist of marine sediments that accumulated within the continental shelf of the northern, passive continental margin of India prior to its collision with Asia. The Cenozoic collision of India with Asia subsequently deformed and metamorphosed these strata as it thrust them southward and upward.   The Rongbuk Formation consists of a sequence of high-grade metamorphic and granitic rocks that were derived from the alteration of high-grade metasedimentary rocks. During the collision of India with Asia, these rocks were thrust downward and to the north as they were overridden by other strata; heated, metamorphosed, and partially melted at depths of over  below sea level; and then forced upward to surface by thrusting towards the south between two major detachments.  The Himalayas are rising by about 5 mm per year.

Flora and fauna

There is very little native flora or fauna on Everest. There is a moss that grows at 6480 m on Mount Everest.  It may be the highest altitude plant species.  An alpine cushion plant called Arenaria is known to grow below  in the region. 

Euophrys omnisuperstes, a minute black jumping spider, has been found at elevations as high as 6700 m, possibly making it the highest confirmed non-microscopic permanent resident on Earth. It lurks in crevices and may 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 as high as the South Col at 7920 m.  Yellow-billed choughs have been seen as high as  and the aforementioned bar-headed geese migrate over the Himalayas.   As early as 1953, George Lowe on the famous expedition of Tenzing and Hillary noted seeing the geese fly over Mount Everest. 

Yaks are often used to haul gear for Mount Everest climbs; they can haul 100 kg (220 pounds), and have thick fur and big lungs. One common piece of advice for those in the Everest region is to be on higher ground when around yaks and other animals, as they can knock people off the mountain if standing on the downhill edge of a trail.  Other animals in the region include the Himalayan tahr which is sometimes eaten by the snow leopard.  The Himalayan black bear can be found up to about  and the red panda is also in the region.  One science expedition found a surprising range of species in the region including a pika that eats its own faeces and ten new species of ants. 

Environment

In 2008, a new weather station at about 8000 m altitude (26,246 feet) went online. The station's first data in May 2008 were air temperature , relative humidity 41.3%, atmospheric pressure 382.1 hPa (38.21 kPa), wind direction 262.8°, wind speed 12.8 m/s (28.6 mph, 46.1 km/h), global solar radiation 711.9 watts/m2, solar UVA radiation 30.4 W/m2. The project was orchestrated by Stations at High Altitude for Research on the Environment (SHARE), who also placed the Mount Everest webcam in 2011. The weather station is located on the South Col and is solar powered. 

One of the issues facing climbers is the frequent presence of high-speed winds.  The peak of Mount Everest extends into the upper troposphere and penetrates the stratosphere, which can expose it to the fast and freezing wind of the jet stream.  In February 2004 a wind speed of 175 mph was recorded at the summit and winds over 100 mph are common. These winds can blow climbers off Everest. Climbers typically aim for the 7- to 10-day windows in the spring and fall when the Asian monsoon season is either starting up or ending and the winds are lighter. The air pressure at the summit is about one-third what it is at sea level, and by Bernoulli's principle, the winds can lower the pressure further, causing an additional 14% reduction in oxygen to climbers. The reduction in oxygen availability comes from the reduced overall pressure, not a reduction in the ratio of oxygen to other gases. 

In the summer, the Indian monsoon brings warm wet air from the Indian ocean to Everest's south side. During the winter the West/South-West flowing jet stream shifts south and blows on the peak. 

History of expeditions

Because Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world, it has attracted considerable attention and climbing attempts. A set of climbing routes has been established over several decades of climbing expeditions to the mountain. Whether the mountain was climbed in ancient times is unknown; it may have been climbed in 1924.

Overview

It was finally known to have been summited by 1953, but it remained a difficult peak for decades. Despite the effort and attention poured into expeditions, it was only summited by about 200 people by 1987. Everest showed itself to be a difficult place for decades, even for serious attempts by professional climbers and large national expeditions, which were the norm until the commercial era picked up in the 1990s.

By March 2012, Everest had been climbed 5,656 times with 223 deaths.  Although lower mountains can be longer or steeper climbs, Everest is so high the jet stream can hit it. Climbers can be faced with winds beyond 200 mph when the weather shifts.  At certain times of the year the jet stream shifts north, providing periods of relative calm at the mountain. Other dangers include blizzards and avalanches.

By 2013, the Himalayan database recorded 6,871 summits by 4,042 different people. 

Early attempts

In 1885, Clinton Thomas Dent, president of the Alpine Club, suggested that climbing Mount Everest was possible in his book Above the Snow Line. 

The northern approach to the mountain was discovered by George Mallory and Guy Bullock on the initial 1921 British Reconnaissance Expedition. It was an exploratory expedition not equipped for a serious attempt to climb the mountain. With Mallory leading (and thus becoming the first European to set foot on Everest's flanks) they climbed the North Col to an altitude of 7005 m. From there, Mallory espied a route to the top, but the party was unprepared for the great task of climbing any further and descended.

The British returned for a 1922 expedition. George Finch ("The other George") climbed using oxygen for the first time. He ascended at a remarkable speed—290 m per hour, and reached an altitude of 8320 m, the first time a human reported to climb higher than 8,000 m. This feat was entirely lost on the British climbing establishment—except for its "unsporting" nature. Mallory and Col. Felix Norton made a second unsuccessful attempt. Mallory was faulted for leading a group down from the North Col which got caught in an avalanche. Mallory was pulled down too, but seven native porters were killed.

The next expedition was in 1924. The initial attempt by Mallory and Geoffrey Bruce was aborted when weather conditions precluded the establishment of Camp VI. The next attempt was that of Norton and Somervell, who climbed without oxygen and in perfect weather, traversing the North Face into the Great Couloir. Norton managed to reach 8550 m, though he ascended only 30 m or so in the last hour. Mallory rustled up oxygen equipment for a last-ditch effort. He chose young Andrew Irvine as his partner.

On 8 June 1924, George Mallory and Andrew Irvine made an attempt on the summit via the North Col/North Ridge/Northeast Ridge route from which they never returned. On 1 May 1999, the Mallory and Irvine Research Expedition found Mallory's body on the North Face in a snow basin below and to the west of the traditional site of Camp VI. Controversy has raged in the mountaineering community whether one or both of them reached the summit 29 years before the confirmed ascent (and of course, safe descent) of Everest by Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953.

In 1933, Lady Houston, a British millionairess, funded the Houston Everest Flight of 1933, which saw a formation of aircraft led by the Marquess of Clydesdale fly over the summit in an effort to deploy the British Union Flag at the top. 

Early expeditions—such as General Charles Bruce's in the 1920s and Hugh Ruttledge's two unsuccessful attempts in 1933 and 1936—tried to make an ascent of the mountain from Tibet, via the north face. Access was closed from the north to western expeditions in 1950, after China asserted control over Tibet. In 1950, Bill Tilman and a small party which included Charles Houston, Oscar Houston and Betsy Cowles undertook an exploratory expedition to Everest through Nepal along the route which has now become the standard approach to Everest from the south.

The Swiss expedition of 1952, led by Edouard Wyss-Dunant, was granted permission to attempt a climb from Nepal. The expedition established a route through the Khumbu ice fall and ascended to the South Col at an elevation of 7986 m. No attempt at an ascent of Everest was ever under consideration in this case.  Raymond Lambert and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay were able to reach a height of about 8595 m on the southeast ridge, setting a new climbing altitude record. Tenzing's experience was useful when he was hired to be part of the British expedition in 1953. 

First successful ascent by Tenzing and Hillary

In 1953, a ninth British expedition, led by John Hunt, returned to Nepal. Hunt selected two climbing pairs to attempt to reach the summit. The first pair (Tom Bourdillon and Charles Evans) came within 100 m of the summit on 26 May 1953, but turned back after running into oxygen problems. As planned, their work in route finding and breaking trail and their caches of extra oxygen were of great aid to the following pair. Two days later, the expedition made its second and final assault on the summit with its second climbing pair, the New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, a Nepali sherpa climber from Darjeeling, India. They reached the summit at 11:30 am local time on 29 May 1953 via the South Col Route. At the time, both acknowledged it as a team effort by the whole expedition, but Tenzing revealed a few years later that Hillary had put his foot on the summit first. They paused at the summit to take photographs and buried a few sweets and a small cross in the snow before descending.

News of the expedition's success reached London on the morning of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation, 2 June. Returning to Kathmandu a few days later, Hunt (a Briton) and Hillary (a New Zealander) discovered that they had been promptly knighted in the Order of the British Empire for the ascent.  Tenzing, a Nepali sherpa who was a citizen of India, was granted the George Medal by the UK. Hunt was ultimately made a life peer in Britain, while Hillary became a founding member of the Order of New Zealand. 
Hillary and Tenzing are also nationally recognised in Nepal, where annual ceremonies in schools and offices celebrate their accomplishment. 

The next successful ascent was on 23 May 1956 by Ernst Schmied and Juerg Marmet. This was followed by Dölf Reist and Hans-Rudolf von Gunten on 24 May 1957. Wang Fuzhou, Gonpo and Qu Yinhua of China made the first reported ascent of the peak from the North Ridge on 25 May 1960. The first American to climb Everest, Jim Whittaker, joined by Nawang Gombu, reached the summit on 1 May 1963.  

1970 disaster

In 1970 Japanese mountaineers conducted a major expedition, the centerpiece was a large "siege" style expedition working on finding a new route up the Southwest face lead by Saburo Matsukata, and another was an attempt to ski Mount Everest. Despite a staff of over one hundred people and a decade of planning work, the expeditions suffered 8 deaths and failed to summit via their planned route. However, Japanese expeditions did enjoy some successes, such as Yuichiro Miura's becoming the first man to ski down Everest from the South Col (he descended nearly 4,200 vertical feet from the South Col before falling with extreme injuries), and an expedition that put four on the summit via the South col route.   Miura's exploits became the subject of film, and he went on to become the oldest person to summit Mount Everest in 2003 at age 70 and again in 2013 at the age of 80. 

Also, later in the 1970s the Japanese woman Junko Tabei became the first human female to summit Mount Everest.

1996 disaster

On 11 May 1996 eight climbers died after several expeditions were caught in a blizzard high up on the mountain. During the entire 1996 season, 15 people died while climbing on Mount Everest. These were the highest death tolls for a single event, and for a single season, until the sixteen deaths in the 2014 Mount Everest avalanche.  The disaster gained wide publicity and raised questions about the commercialization of climbing Mount Everest.

Journalist Jon Krakauer, on assignment from Outside magazine, was in one of the affected parties, and afterwards published the bestseller Into Thin Air, which related his experience. Anatoli Boukreev, a guide who felt impugned by Krakauer's book, co-authored a rebuttal book called The Climb. The dispute sparked a debate within the climbing community.

In May 2004, Kent Moore, a physicist, and John L. Semple, a surgeon, both researchers from the University of Toronto, told New Scientist magazine that an analysis of weather conditions on 11 May suggested that freak weather caused oxygen levels to plunge approximately 14%.   

One of the survivors was Beck Weathers, an American client of New Zealand-based guide service Adventure Consultants. Weathers was left for dead about 275 meters (900 feet) from camp 4 at 7950 meters (26085 feet).  After spending a night on the mountain, Weathers managed to find his way to camp 4 with massive frostbite and vision impaired due to snow blindness.   When he arrived in camp 4, fellow climbers considered his condition terminal and left him in a tent to die overnight. 

Before leaving camp 4 Jon Krakauer heard Weathers calling for help from his tent.  Beck's condition had not improved and an immediate descent to a lower elevation was deemed essential.   A helicopter rescue was considered but was out of the question; camp 4 was higher than the rated ceiling of any available helicopter and in any case would be extraordinarily dangerous.  Eventually a rescue was organized thanks to a Lieutenant Colonel of the Nepal army who conducted the second-highest known helicopter medical evacuation up to that time.

The storm's impact on climbers on the North Ridge of Mount Everest, where several climbers also died, was detailed in a first-hand account by British filmmaker and writer Matt Dickinson in his book The Other Side of Everest. 16-year-old Mark Pfetzer was on the climb and wrote about it in his account, Within Reach: My Everest Story.

The 2015 feature film Everest, directed by Baltasar Kormákur, is based on the actual events of this disaster.

2006 mountaineering season

In 2006 12 people died. One death in particular (see below) triggered an international debate and years of discussion about climbing ethics.  The season was also remembered for the rescue of Lincoln Hall who had been left by his climbing team and declared dead, but was later discovered alive and survived being helped off the mountain.

David Sharp ethics controversy

There was an international controversy about the death of a solo British climber David Sharp, who attempted to climb Mount Everest in 2006 but died in his attempt. The story broke out of the mountaineering community into popular media, with a snow-balling series of interviews, allegations, critiques, and peace-making. The question was whether climbers that season had left a man to die, and whether he could have been saved. It seemed to be clear that he had put himself in a very dangerous situationhe was said to have attempted to summit Mount Everest by himself with no Sherpa or guide and fewer oxygen bottles than considered normal. He went with a low-budget Nepali guide firm that only provides support up to Base Camp, after which climbers go as a "loose group", offering a high degree of independence. The manager at Sharp's guide support said Sharp did not take enough oxygen for his summit attempt and did not have a Sherpa guide.  It is less clear who knew Sharp was in trouble, and if they did know, whether they were qualified or capable of helping him. Double-amputee climber Mark Inglis revealed in an interview with the press on 23 May 2006, that his climbing party, and many others, had passed Sharp, on 15 May, sheltering under a rock overhang 450 m below the summit, without attempting a rescue. Inglis had said 40 people had passed by Sharp, but he was not aware that Turkish climbers had tried to help him despite being in the process of helping an injured woman down (a Turkish woman named Burçak Poçan). There has also been some discussion about Himex in the commentary on Inglis and Sharp. In regards to the Inglis's initial comments, he later revised certain details because he had been interviewed while he was "...physically and mentally exhausted, and in a lot of pain. He had suffered severe frostbite — he later had five fingertips amputated." When they went through Sharp's possession they found a receipt for $7,490USD, believed to be the whole financial cost. Comparatively, most expeditions are between $30 to $100,000USD plus an additional $20,000 in other expenses that range from gear to bonuses.  It was estimated on 14 May that Sharp summitted Mount Everest and began his descent down, but 15 May he was in trouble but being passed by climbers on their way up and down. On 15 May 2006 it is believed he was suffering from hypoxia, and was about 1,000 feet from the summit on the North Side route.

Some climbers who left him said that the rescue efforts would have been useless and only have caused more deaths. Beck Weathers of the 1996 Mount Everest disaster said that those who are dying are often left behind, and that he himself had been left for dead twice but was able to keep walking.  The Tribune of India quoted someone who described what happened to Sharp as "the most shameful act in the history of mountaineering".  In addition to David's death, at least nine other climbers perished that year, including multiple Sherpas working for various guiding companies. 

Much of this controversy was captured by the Discovery Channel while filming the television program Everest: Beyond the Limit. A crucial decision affecting the fate of Sharp is shown in the program, where an early returning climber Lebanese adventurer Maxim Chaya is descending from the summit and radios to his base camp manager (Russell Brice) that he has found a frostbitten and unconscious climber in distress. Chaya is unable to identify Sharp, who had chosen to climb solo without any support and so did not identify himself to other climbers. The base camp manager assumes that Sharp is part of a group that has already calculated that they must abandon him, and informs his lone climber that there is no chance of him being able to help Sharp by himself. 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 frostbite, 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 climb without support left him with no margin for recovery.

David Sharp's body remained just below the summit on the Chinese side next to another corpse nicknamed "Green Boots"; they shared a space in a small rock cave that was an ad hoc tomb for them.  Sharp's body was removed from the cave in 2007, according to the BBC, and since 2014, Green Boots has been missing, presumably removed or buried.

Lincoln Hall rescue

As the Sharp debate kicked off, on 26 May 2006 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. Similar actions have been recorded since, including on 21 May 2007, when Canadian climber Meagan McGrath initiated the successful high-altitude rescue of Nepali Usha Bista. Recognizing her heroic rescue, Major Meagan McGrath was selected as a 2011 recipient of the Sir Edmund Hillary Foundation of Canada Humanitarian Award, which recognises a Canadian who has personally or administratively contributed a significant service or act in the Himalayan Region of Nepal. 

Ascent statistics up to 2010 season

By the end of the 2010 climbing season, there had been 5,104 ascents to the summit by about 3,142 individuals, with 77% of these ascents being accomplished since 2000. The summit was achieved in 7 of the 22 years from 1953 to 1974, and was not missed between 1975 and 2014. In 2007, the record number of 633 ascents was recorded, by 350 climbers and 253 sherpas.

A remarkable illustration of the explosion of popularity of Everest is provided by the numbers of daily ascents. Analysis of the 1996 Mount Everest disaster shows that part of the blame was on the bottleneck caused by the large number of climbers (33 to 36) attempting to summit on the same day; this was considered unusually high at the time. By comparison, on 23 May 2010, the summit of Mount Everest was reached by 169 climbers – more summits in a single day than in the cumulative 31 years from the first successful summit in 1953 through 1983.

There have been 219 fatalities recorded on Mount Everest from the 1922 British Mount Everest Expedition through the end of 2010, a rate of 4.3 fatalities for every 100 summits (this is a general rate, and includes fatalities amongst support climbers, those who turned back before the peak, those who died en route to the peak and those who died while descending from the peak). Of the 219 fatalities, 58 (26.5%) were climbers who had summited but did not complete their descent. Though the rate of fatalities has decreased since the year 2000 (1.4 fatalities for every 100 summits, with 3938 summits since 2000), the significant increase in the total number of climbers still means 54 fatalities since 2000: 33 on the northeast ridge, 17 on the southeast ridge, 2 on southwest face, and 2 on north face.

Nearly all attempts at the summit are done using one of the two main routes. The traffic seen by each route varies from year to year. In 2005–07, more than half of all climbers elected to use the more challenging, but cheaper northeast route. In 2008, the northeast route was closed by the Chinese government for the entire climbing season, and the only people able to reach the summit from the north that year were athletes responsible for carrying the Olympic torch for the 2008 Summer Olympics.  The route was closed to foreigners once again in 2009 in the run-up to the 50th anniversary of the Dalai Lama's exile.  These closures led to declining interest in the north route, and, in 2010, two-thirds of the climbers reached the summit from the south.

2012 mountaineering season

In 2012 Montana State University conducted a scientific expedition to Everest.  The Everest Education Expedition studied the geology of the Everest massif which includes Everest-Nuptse-Lhotse-Khumbutse, and advanced the state of mineralogy, strain, and predicted rock ages. Of interest was the fossil-bearing limestone that crowns Mount Everest, the nature and impact of ice in the region (such as the icefall), and the overall stratigraphy (including limestone, metamorphic rocks, pelites, and quartzites) 

In 2012 the oldest woman to reach the summit up to that time was achieved by Tamae Watanabe at 73 years old  She broke her own record from 2002, when she climbed it at the age of 63.  The retired office worker lives at the base of Mount Fuji, and had also climbed many other peaks including Denali, the Eiger, and Lhotse. She climbed with a group of four, and beat a competing 72-year-old woman who was trying for the same record.

The death of Canadian climber Shriya Shah-Klorfine in 2012 made headlines and fed a debate about whether inexperienced climbers should be climbing Mount Everest.  Although she did manage to summit, she did not survive the descent.  Francys Arsentiev died on descent in 1998 despite the efforts of her husband and a team from Uzbekistan that ran low of bottled oxygen.  In 1979, another woman named Hannelore Schmatz successfully summited, but like the other two, became exhausted and ran out of oxygen despite the efforts of her climbing group to save her.  Ray Genet, in her climbing party died also, but the two Sherpas survived. In 1984 Yogendra Bahadur Thapa and Ang Dorje died trying retrieve her corpse. Schmatz remained frozen on the mountain, with her eyes frozen open and hair left to blow in the wind, to the emotional disturbance of later climbers in the 1980s and 1990s.

Between 1922 and 2012 it is recorded that at least 233 died climbing Mount Everest. With hundreds of climbers on the most popular route on the most popular days, deaths have become almost too routine as many climbers have accepted that some are just not going to make it, even though they are left with a lingering moral question of if they should have done more to save those in trouble.

National Geographic says that 547 people summited in 2012.  Of those that attempted the summit, this was a 57 percent success rate and a higher rate than the year 2000's 24% success rate. The number of summiters has grown also, with National Geographic comparing the 72 summits in 1990, 145 summits in 2000, and the aforementioned 547 summits in 2012.

The Guinness Book of World Records states that 234 climbers summited in one day in 2012.  However, it was one of the deadliest seasons since 1996, with 11 climbers dying on Everest in the spring. 

2013 mountaineering season

In 2013, about 340 permits to climb Everest were granted.  Since Tenzing and Hillary climbed in the 1950s, about 4,000 people had climbed Everest in the years leading up to 2013. That year, three climbers were attacked by a mob of 100 Sherpas at 21,000 feet altitude.  The event was noted as an aberration in the otherwise decades long spirit of teamwork and friendship on the mountain. Dangers other than the elements are not unknown to climbers; for example, in 2013 11 climbers were murdered by Taliban in their base camp in nearby Pakistan while at the 8000er Nanga Parbat.  The brawl had various things said about it and one highlight was that Melissa Arnot helped diffusse the fight between three climbers and a mob of Sherpa's.  Arnot was friends with both the climbers and the high-altitude workers, and when the brawl happened she managed to bring a halt to the fighting, then spend the better part of an hour negotiating a truce between the mountaineers.  Sherpas are famous for going to extraordinary lengths for climbers, being friendly, and very generous in sharing Everest with visitors to Nepal.  In this case a group of three climbers accidentally triggered some resentment that been building and this snow-balled into a full-out mob attack on them which was fortunately averted when cooler thinking prevailed.  The Nepal authorities and police investigated and removed three ring-leaders and declared that they would try to protect climbers.  In a situation vaugley similar to when Pocahontas saved John Smith, the 29-years young Arnot throw herself between the attackers and the climbers being beaten thus averting their possible murder.  One fact worked in favor, was that she figured they would be less likely to strike a lady, and once the conversation could started it was possible resolve what the tangle of misunderstandings and emotions that come together to trigger the crisis.  Mountaineers are well aware of the confusion and delirium high altitude can trigger, and the nuttiness of client request can wear on Sherpa's who also may not have had the most clear emotions and insight high on the Lhotse face.  Once the conversations started, it was possible to resolve the situation. 

In 2013 a group of Sherpas attacked one climber and attempted to murder him after he returned to camp.  Events including swinging an ice pick at him as he climbed the Lhotse face, making physical contact with his climbing partner, verbal threats, the throwing of a knife which impacted but did not penetrate his skin, and other attacks. This was only preliminary, and one part of the attack was described by the climber as "they told us, "Now we kill you. Now we kill you." One of them threw a big stone into Ueli Steck's face, and he started to bleed. Then they were punching my face, and then kicks and punches and kicks and punches. And stones and so on." The climber was upset because he considered himself a friend of the Sherpa community, had built a school for nearly 400 Sherpa children, and also had funded free evacuations via helicopters for Sherpas. The Nepalese government said if climbers were attacked, actions would be taken against the aggressors. Indeed the Nepal tourism officals removed the three ringleaders of the attack from the Mountain and determined that it was misunderstanding that had sorted out, furthermore they pledge to try to insure the safety of climbers.  Sherpas are famous for the most part for their climbing skill and good demeanor, with one Everest climber noting "To a man everyone seems to be absolutely impressed with the Sherpas. Not just their strength on the mountain, which is legendary, but their personalities and their friendliness. They become your friends.”   One positive thing to come out of the fight was increased conversations between all the people on the mountain, which help overcome come some of the cultural and language barriers that complicate an already difficult environment.  In retrospect on of the main culprits was some ice that came down the mountain after the Sherpa's allowed the three climbers to go above them. On the mountains climbers "life fast and die young"; one Sherpa noted how he talked with Marty Schmidt about the situationMarty died with his son just a few months later in Avalanche on K2.  The next year 16 Sherpas died when an ice serac fell on them in the Khumbu. 

In 2013 Yuichiro Miura became the oldest person yet to reach the summit, at age 80.  Also, a Eurocopter AS350 B3 flown by M. Folini achieved a record breaking rescue at 7800 m, by retrieving fallen climber Sudarshan Gautam between Camps III & IV in Everest's Yellow Band on the morning of 20 May 2013.     Gautam has no arms or prosthetics but reached the summit on 20 May 2013.

The updated 2013 Himalayan database recorded 658 summits, which brought the total number of summits to 6,871 by 4,042 different people. In comparison, it took 41 years after Tenzing and Hillary to achieve the same number of climbs.  This is also greater than 2007's 633 summiters. 

2014 avalanche and season

On 18 April 2014, an avalanche hit the area just below the Base Camp 2 at around 0100 UTC (0630 local time) and at an elevation of about 5,900 metres. Sixteen people were killed in the avalanche (all Nepalese guides) and nine more were injured. Sadly, this was not the only tragedy in the region with over 43 killed in the 2014 Nepal snowstorm disaster, and they were not even summiting but rather trekking the Annapurna Circuit.

One positive outcome of the season was a 13-year-old girl, Malavath Purna, reaching the summit, breaking the record for youngest female.  Additionally, one team used a helicopter to fly from South base camp to Camp 2 to avoid the Khumbu Icefall, then reached the Everest summit. This team had to use the south side because the Chinese had denied them a permit to climb. Nepal turned Chinese reluctance into a success for the country, with the executive donating tens of thousands of dollars to local hospitals and achieving a new hybrid aviation/mountaneering stylethey awarded her the Nepalese International Mountaineer of the Year. 

Over 100 people summitted Everest from China (Tibet region), and six from Nepal in the 2014 season.  This included 72-year old Bill Burke, the Indian teenage girl and a Chinese woman Jing Wang.  Another teen girl summiter was Ming Kipa Sherpa who summited with her big sister Lhakpa Sherpa in 2003, and who  achieved the most times for woman to the summit of Mount Everest at that time.  (see also Santosh Yadav)

2015 avalanche, earthquake, season

2015 was set to be a record breaking season of climbs, with hundreds of permits issued in Nepal and many additional permits in Tibet (China); however, a magnitude 7.8 earthquake on 25 April 2015 effectively shut down the Everest climbing season.  2015 was the first time since 1974 with no spring summits, as all climbing teams pulled out after the quakes and avalanche. 
One of the reasons for this was the high probability (over 50% according to the USGS) of aftershocks.  Indeed, just weeks after the first quake, the region was rattled by a 7.3 magnitude quake and there were also many considerable aftershocks. 

On 25 April 2015, an earthquake measuring 7.8 Mw triggered an avalanche that hit Everest Base Camp.  18 bodies were recovered from Mount Everest by the Indian army mountaineering team.  The avalanche began on Pumori,  moved through the Khumbu Icefall on the southwest side of Mount Everest, and slammed into the South Base Camp. 

The quakes trapped hundreds of climbers above the Khumbu icefall, and they had to be evacuated by helicopter as they ran low on supplies.  The quake shifted the route through the icefall making it essentially unpassable to the climbers. Bad weather also made helicopter evacuation difficult. The Everest tragedy was small compared the impact overall on Nepal, with almost 9 thousand dead in Nepal  and about 22 thousand injured. In Tibet (China) by 28 April it was identified that at least 25 had died and 117 were injured.  By 29 April 2015, the Tibet Mountaineering Association (North/Chinese side) closed Everest and other peaks to climbing, stranding 25 teams and about 300 people on the north side of Everest.  On the south side helicopters evacuated 180 people trapped at Camps 1 and 2. 

Mountain re-opens in August 2015

On 24 August 2015 Nepal re-opened Everest to tourism including mountain climbers.  The only climber permit for the autumn season was awarded to Japanese climber Nobukazu Kuriki, who had tried four times previously to summit Everest without success. He made his fifth attempt in October, but had to give up just 700 meters from the summit due to "strong winds and deep snow".   Kurki noted the dangers of climbing Everest, having himself survived being stuck in a freezing snow-hole for two days near the top, which came at the cost of all his finger tips and his thumb, lost to frostbite, which added further difficulty to his climb.

Some sections of the trail from Lukla to Everest Base Camp (Nepal) were damaged in the earthquakes earlier in the year and needed repairs to handle trekkers. 

2016 season

The Nepal Department of Tourism said by June 2016 that about 456 people made it to summit of Mount Everest, including 45 women. They noted some good summit windows and on one day, 19 May 2016, 209 made it to the summit.  By May 11, 2016 the lines were fixed on the south side of Everest after which several hundred climbers would make it up in the critical weather windows. 

On 11 May 2016 nine Sherpas summited Mount Everest. The next day another six people reached the top.  These were the first summitings since 2014, when 106 made it to the top.  By 13 May, 42 climbers had reached the summit  and by 22 May, good weather had allowed over 400 climbers to reach the summit. However, about 30 climbers developed frostbite or became sick and two climbers died from what was reported as possible altitude sickness. (see fatalities section for additional reports) Among those that had to turn back, was a science expedition attempting to study the link between hypoxia and cognitive decline.  Although it did not run its course it did give some clues into the effects of high-altitude acclimatization on human blood.

Adrian Ballinger and Cory Richards were sponsored by Eddie Bauer to do an Everest climb, and they relayed information from the Everest climb using the smartphone software application and service Snapchat.  Mount Everest has had a 3G wireless data communication network since 2010.  One of the things that was reported by them, was that bottled oxygen was stolen from them and there was some bad behavior up there. The bottled oxygen was there for emergency back-up if they ran into trouble. Cor Richards achieved summiting Mount Everest without oxygen and returned safely, and Adrian made it almost to the top also. Another famous mountaineer,  British climber Kenton Cool achieved his 12th Everest summit (the second highest number of Everest summitings for a foreigner after Dave Hahn), and U.S. celebrity mountaineer Melissa Arnot, completed her sixth summit, and achieved her personal goal of climbing Everest without supplementary bottled oxygen.  This also turned out to be the most summits for a foreign female (Not Nepali or Chinese), and one of the first U.S. woman to summit and survive without supplementary oxygen. In 1998 Francys Arsentiev had made it to the summit but died during the descent; she went on to become a famous corpse-landmark known as "Sleeping Beauty" until she was buried on Everest in 2007 by one of the people that had tried help her.  Another woman from the Americas, the Ecuadorian woman Carla Perez also summited Mount Everest in 2016 without supplementary oxygen.  Perez and Arnot became the 5 and 6 women to summit Everest without supplementary oxygen as reported by the The Guardian. There is something of an ongoing discussion about the use of extra bottled oxygen in mountaineering. Bottled oxygen is really just the start of slippery slope that goes beyond acclimatization.  The elephant in the room is Dexamethasone, which is extremely valuable as a life-saver because it can reduce swelling in the brain if someone comes down with HACE but has nevertheless may have become popular. One climbing magazine called it "Climbing's Little Helper" and linked it to several high-altitude mountaineering medical crisis and even fatalities.  When American Bill Burke was interviewed for his attempt, he noted how one of his team-members had overdosed on Dex causing a medical evacuation even as in his more recent expedition someone had 25 doses of dex.  He also noted it was hard to argue against large supplies of dex, due its life-saving properties against some types of altitude sickness, especially cerebral edema (HACE). An example of a death in which dex was implicated was Dr. Eberhard Schaaf in 2012 on Everest. Schaaf died on descent at the south summit from altitude sickness.  It has a good reputation as a life saver, and is commonly given to Everest climbers for its ability to intervene in last desperate moments when altitude sickness sets in. For example, in the 2016 season Robert Gropel said he gave dex to his wife (as reported by the Telegraph) in attempt to save her as they tried to descend Everest.  Of course, Dex is just the tip of the iceberg, with the UIAA noting the aforementioned dexamethasone, but also  acetazolamide (aka Diamox), amphetamine, and alcohol use;  and another noted Diamox (acetazolamide) use among trekkers.  Its not really a matter of some authorities being for or against medications, but awareness, as misuse can cause drug interactions and various side effects.  In particular it was noted that supplementary oxygen significantly lowers death rate on ultra-high altitude mountain climbing, and is generally not regulated as a drug, whereas the safe use of medications is less understood or even acknowledged in many cases. (See also Effects of high altitude on humans)

Mexican-American David Liaño Gonzalez (aka David Liano) summited for the sixth time, promoting a charity and also bringing a Seattle Seahawks fan flag with him to the Everest summit.   Another sports team represented at the Everest summit was the Denver Broncos, with their flag unfurled by Kim Hess of Colorado, USA (a state also known for its mountains, "the Rockies").  Rounding out U.S. mountaineering was news that a group of soldiers and veterans summited, including some that had been wounded in combat.  A British wounded veteran (one-eyed) was also trying to summit but gave up his bid to help some Indian climbers.

Also the first climbers from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Tunisia reached the summit of Mount Everest.    Only two other people from the North Africa region neighbouring Tunisia have summited Everest, one from Algeria and the other from Morocco. The youngest Australian woman to summit Mount Everest became Alyssa Azar, with her story widely reported in Australian and some international news.  She returned to Australia safely, but a bittersweet victory for Australia after the loss of an another Australian woman that was also trying to summit that May with her husband. The youngest Japanese woman also summited (and returned alive) at the age of 19. Another woman record breaker in 2016 was the first woman from Thailand to summit Mount Everest, Napassaporn Chumnarnsit, who was even given a meeting with Prime Minister of Thailand for achievement upon her return.   The first person with Cystic Fibrosis also summited Mount Everest on their third try.  Also, a 61-year old summited with two artificial knees.  He had been trying for several years and had lost his Nepali friend Sherpa Nawang Tenzing in the 2015 earthquakes. He was not alone in being grief-stricken, as many climbers connected with Everest mountaineering community lost climbing buddies in two years of disasters.  One who narrowly survived the disasters himself climbed this year to bring attention to the disease Lewy Body Dementia which afflicted his dad whom he cared for.

Rescues and fatalities

A one-eyed British war veteran rescued a woman from India who was in trouble on her descent.  As reported by the BBC, the climber, Leslie Binns, successfully rescued her and tried to save another from her ill-fated eleven-person expedition which suffered three fatalties. About 500 meters from the summit, which he could see with his one eye, he heard a woman screaming for help so he gave up his summit bid to help her down.  She had run out of bottled oxygen and was getting frostbitten.

On 11 May 2016 a Canadian doctor from Calgary died in Tibet, in the Chinese-side base camp.  A 25-year old Nepali fixing lines near the Lhotse summit fell, named Phurba Sherpa (note: this name is shared by other well-known Sherpas).   A guide company called Arnold Coster Expeditions suffered two fatalities, and third client had to be airlifted out.  One was a man from the The Netherlands, and another was a South African born Australian woman. Her husband had tried to save her, but he also ran into trouble and had to be air-lifted out with medical complications. These deaths were very widely reported in international news and triggered some public discussion about Everest mountaineering and tourism.

A Indian expedition from West Bengal suffered a great tragedy, with the single expedition suffering three fatalities and third, a mother of an 11-year old had to be rescued on her way down. At first it was reported one died and two were missing, but later the other two were located and had not survived. One British climber gave up his summit bid to help a Bengali woman that had fallen and was ailing on her descent.  She was further evacuated by the Himalayan Rescue Association and airlifted to Kathmandu with bad frostbite injuries.  They were part of an eleven-member expedition from India, and eight reached the summit including the woman

The death toll for Everest climbers rose to 5 in most reports by late May 2016, and with a death of a high-altitude worker on Lhotse face during the season (Everest summiters sometimes need to climb Lhotse face depending on the route), gives a total of 6 known deaths from the Everest massif by the time the season drew to a close. Although not widely reported during May, a climber in Tibet had died on 11 May 2016 which makes it possibly six for Mount Everest and seven for the Everest Massif. The Nepal ministry of tourism said five people died (for the Nepal side).

Climbing

Permits

There were 334 climbing permits issued in 2014, these were extended for free because of the tragedy that struck. In 2015 there was 357 permits to climb Everest, but the mountain was closed again because of the avalanche and earthquake. Nepal then extended the unused 2014/15 permits until 2019 (Nepali permits cost about 10,000 USD for foreigners). So people who bought a permit in 2014 or 2015 can still use it for an expedition to Everest until 2019 (normally they are only valid for one year).  This was an example of hospitality that Nepali's have become famous for; an extension was especially requested by expedition firms (which in turn bring resources into the country due for mountaineering). Nepal is essentially a "fourth world" country, one of the poorest non-African countries and the 19th poorest country in the world.  Despite this, Nepal has been very welcoming to tourists and a significant tourism industry has been established.

Routes

Mt. Everest has two main climbing routes, the southeast ridge from Nepal and the north ridge from Tibet, as well as many other less frequently climbed routes. Of the two main routes, the southeast ridge is technically easier and is the more frequently used route. It was the route used by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay in 1953 and the first recognised of fifteen routes to the top by 1996. This was, however, a route decision dictated more by politics than by design as the Chinese border was closed to the western world in the 1950s after the People's Republic of China invaded Tibet.

Most attempts are made during May before the summer monsoon season. As the monsoon season approaches, a change in the jet stream at this time pushes it northward, thereby reducing the average wind speeds high on the mountain. While attempts are sometimes made after the monsoons in September and October, when the jet stream is again temporarily pushed northward, the additional snow deposited by the monsoons and the less stable weather patterns (tail end of the monsoon) makes climbing extremely difficult.

Southeast ridge

The ascent via the southeast ridge begins with a trek to Base Camp at 5380 m on the south side of Everest in Nepal. Expeditions usually fly into Lukla (2,860 m) from Kathmandu and pass through Namche Bazaar. Climbers then hike to Base Camp, which usually takes six to eight days, allowing for proper altitude acclimatization in order to prevent altitude sickness. Climbing equipment and supplies are carried by yaks, dzopkyos (yak-cow hybrids) and human porters to Base Camp on the Khumbu Glacier. When Hillary and Tenzing climbed Everest in 1953, the British expedition that they were part of (over 400 climbers, porters and sherpas at that point) started from the Kathmandu Valley, as there were no roads further east at that time.

Climbers spend a couple of weeks in Base Camp, acclimatizing to the altitude. During that time, Sherpas and some expedition climbers set up ropes and ladders in the treacherous Khumbu Icefall. Seracs, crevasses and shifting blocks of ice make the icefall one of the most dangerous sections of the route. Many climbers and Sherpas have been killed in this section. To reduce the hazard, climbers usually begin their ascent well before dawn, when the freezing temperatures glue ice blocks in place. Above the icefall is Camp I at 6065 m.

From Camp I, climbers make their way up the Western Cwm to the base of the Lhotse face, where Camp II or Advanced Base Camp (ABC) is established at 6500 m. The Western Cwm is a flat, gently rising glacial valley, marked by huge lateral crevasses in the centre, which prevent direct access to the upper reaches of the Cwm. Climbers are forced to cross on the far right near the base of Nuptse to a small passageway known as the "Nuptse corner". The Western Cwm is also called the "Valley of Silence" as the topography of the area generally cuts off wind from the climbing route. The high altitude and a clear, windless day can make the Western Cwm unbearably hot for climbers.

From ABC, climbers ascend the Lhotse face on fixed ropes up to Camp III, located on a small ledge at 7470 m. From there, it is another 500 meters to Camp IV on the South Col at 7920 m. From Camp III to Camp IV, climbers are faced with two additional challenges: the Geneva Spur and the Yellow Band. The Geneva Spur is an anvil shaped rib of black rock named by the 1952 Swiss expedition. Fixed ropes assist climbers in scrambling over this snow-covered rock band. The Yellow Band is a section of interlayered marble, phyllite, and semischist, which also requires about 100 meters of rope for traversing it.

On the South Col, climbers enter the death zone. Climbers typically only have a maximum of two or three days that they can endure at this altitude for making summit bids. Clear weather and low winds are critical factors in deciding whether to make a summit attempt. If weather does not cooperate within these short few days, climbers are forced to descend, many all the way back down to Base Camp.

From Camp IV, climbers begin their summit push around midnight with hopes of reaching the summit (still another 1,000 meters above) within 10 to 12 hours. Climbers first reach "The Balcony" at 8400 m, a small platform where they can rest and gaze at peaks to the south and east in the early light of dawn. Continuing up the ridge, climbers are then faced with a series of imposing rock steps which usually forces them to the east into waist-deep snow, a serious avalanche hazard. At 8750 m, a small table-sized dome of ice and snow marks the South Summit.

From the South Summit, climbers follow the knife-edge southeast ridge along what is known as the "Cornice traverse", where snow clings to intermittent rock. This is the most exposed section of the climb as a misstep to the left would send one  down the southwest face, while to the immediate right is the  Kangshung Face. At the end of this traverse is an imposing 12 m rock wall, the Hillary Step at 8760 m.

Hillary and Tenzing were the first climbers to ascend this step and they did it with primitive ice climbing equipment and ropes. Nowadays, climbers ascend this step using fixed ropes previously set up by Sherpas. Once above the step, it is a comparatively easy climb to the top on moderately angled snow slopes—though the exposure on the ridge is extreme, especially while traversing large cornices of snow. With increasing numbers of people climbing the mountain in recent years, the Step has frequently become a bottleneck, with climbers forced to wait significant amounts of time for their turn on the ropes, leading to problems in getting climbers efficiently up and down the mountain. After the Hillary Step, climbers also must traverse a loose and rocky section that has a large entanglement of fixed ropes that can be troublesome in bad weather. Climbers typically spend less than half an hour at the summit to allow time to descend to Camp IV before darkness sets in, to avoid serious problems with afternoon weather, or because supplemental oxygen tanks run out.

North ridge route

The north ridge route begins from the north side of Everest in Tibet. Expeditions trek to the Rongbuk Glacier, setting up base camp at 5180 m on a gravel plain just below the glacier. To reach Camp II, climbers ascend the medial moraine of the east Rongbuk Glacier up to the base of Changtse at around 6100 m. Camp III (ABC—Advanced Base Camp) is situated below the North Col at . To reach Camp IV on the north col, climbers ascend the glacier to the foot of the col where fixed ropes are used to reach the North Col at 7010 m. From the North Col, climbers ascend the rocky north ridge to set up Camp V at around 7775 m. The route crosses the North Face in a diagonal climb to the base of the Yellow Band reaching the site of Camp VI at 8230 m. From Camp VI, climbers make their final summit push. Climbers face a treacherous traverse from the base of the First Step: ascending from 8501 to, to the crux of the climb, the Second Step: ascending from 8577 to. (The Second Step includes a climbing aid called the "Chinese ladder", a metal ladder placed semi-permanently in 1975 by a party of Chinese climbers.  It has been almost continuously in place since, and ladders have been used by virtually all climbers on the route.) Once above the Second Step the inconsequential Third Step is clambered over: ascending from 8690 to. Once above these steps, the summit pyramid is climbed by a snow slope of 50 degrees, to the final summit ridge along which the top is reached.

Summit

The routes usually share one spot in common, the summit itself. The summit of Everest has been described as "the size of a dining room table".   The summit is capped with snow over ice over rock, and the layer of snow varies from year to year. The rock summit is made of Ordovician limestone and is a  low-grade metamorphic rock according to Montana State University.  (see survey section for more on its height and about the Everest rock summit)

Below the summit there is an area known as "rainbow valley", filled with dead bodies still wearing brightly coloured winter gear. Down to about 8000 meters is an area commonly called the "death zone", due to the high danger and low oxygen because of the low pressure.

Below the summit the mountain slopes downward to the three main sides, or faces, of Mount Everest: the North Face, the South-West Face, and the East/Kangshung Face. 

Death zone

At the higher regions of Mount Everest, climbers seeking the summit typically spend substantial time within the death zone (altitudes higher than 8000 m), and face significant challenges to survival. Temperatures can dip to very low levels, resulting in frostbite of any body part exposed to the air. Since temperatures are so low, snow is well-frozen in certain areas and death or injury by slipping and falling can occur. High winds at these altitudes on Everest are also a potential threat to climbers.

Another significant threat to climbers is low atmospheric pressure. The atmospheric pressure at the top of Everest is about a third of sea level pressure or , resulting in the availability of only about a third as much oxygen to breathe. 

Debilitating effects of the death zone are so great that it takes most climbers up to 12 hours to walk the distance of  from South Col to the summit.  Achieving even this level of performance requires prolonged altitude acclimatization, which takes 40–60 days for a typical expedition. A sea-level dweller exposed to the atmospheric conditions at the altitude above 8500 m without acclimatization would likely lose consciousness within 2 to 3 minutes. 

In May 2007, the Caudwell Xtreme Everest undertook a medical study of oxygen levels in human blood at extreme altitude. Over 200 volunteers climbed to Everest Base Camp where various medical tests were performed to examine blood oxygen levels. A small team also performed tests on the way to the summit.  Even at base camp, the low partial pressure of oxygen had direct effect on blood oxygen saturation levels. At sea level, blood oxygen saturation is generally 98–99%. At base camp, blood saturation fell to between 85 and 87%. Blood samples taken at the summit indicated very low oxygen levels in the blood. A side effect of low blood oxygen is a vastly increased breathing rate, often 80–90 breaths per minute as opposed to a more typical 20–30. Exhaustion can occur merely attempting to breathe. 

Lack of oxygen, exhaustion, extreme cold, and climbing hazards all contribute to the death toll. An injured person who cannot walk is in serious trouble, since rescue by helicopter is generally impractical and carrying the person off the mountain is very risky. People who die during the climb are typically left behind. As of 2006, about 150 bodies had never been recovered. It is not uncommon to find corpses near the standard climbing routes. 

A 2008 study noted that the "death zone" is indeed where most Everest deaths occur, but also noted that most deaths occur during descent from the summit.  A 2014 article in the magazine The Atlantic about deaths on Everest noted that while falling is one of the greatest dangers the DZ presents for all 8000ers, avalanches are a more common cause of death at lower altitudes.  However, Everest climbing is more deadly than Base jumping, although some have combined extreme sports and Everest including a beverage company that had someone base-jumping off Everest in a wingsuit (they did survive, though). 

Despite this, Everest is safer for climbers than a number of peaks by some measurements, but it depends on the period. Some examples are Kangchenjunga, K2, Annapurna, Nanga Parbat, and the Eiger (especially the nordwand). Mont Blanc has more deaths each year than Everest, with over one hundred dying in a typical year and over eight thousand killed since records were kept. Some factors that affect total mountain lethality include the level of popularity of the mountain, the skill of those climbing, and of course the difficulty of the climb.

Another health hazard is retinal haemorrhages, which can damage eyesight and cause blindness. Up to a quarter of Everest climbers can experience retinal haemorrhages, and although they usually heal within weeks of returning to lower altitudes, in one case a climber went blind and ended up dying in the death zone.

The team made a huge effort for the next 12 hours to try to get him down the mountain, but to no avail, as they were not successful getting him down the difficult sections.  Even for the able, the Everest North-East ridge is a recognized as a challenge, which is why it is so hard to rescue someone who has become incapacitatedit is beyond their ability to save them in such a difficult spot. One way around this situation was pioneer by two Nepali men in 2013, who had intended to paraglide off the summit, had major problem in that they were forced to go through with the plan either way because they had run out of bottle oxygen and supplies.  They successfully launched off the summit and para-glided down to Namche in just 42 minutes, without having to climb down the mountain.

Supplemental oxygen

Most expeditions use oxygen masks and tanks above 8000 m.  Everest can be climbed without supplementary oxygen, but only by the most accomplished mountaineers and at increased risk. Humans do not think clearly with low oxygen, and the combination of extreme weather, low temperatures, and steep slopes often requires quick, accurate decisions.  While about 95% of climbers who reach the summit use bottled oxygen in order to reach the top, about 5% of climbers have summitted Everest without supplemental oxygen. The death rate is double for those who attempt to reach the summit without supplemental oxygen.  Travelling above 8,000 feet altitude is a factor in cerebral hypoxia. This decrease of oxygen to the brain can cause dementia and brain damage, as well as a host of other symptoms.  One study found that Mount Everest may be the highest an acclimatised human could go, but also found that climbers may suffer permanent neurological damage despite returning to lower altitudes.

The use of bottled oxygen to ascend Mount Everest has been controversial. It was first used on the 1922 British Mount Everest Expedition by George Finch and Geoffrey Bruce who climbed up to 7800 m at a spectacular speed of 1000 vertical feet per hour (vf/h). Pinned down by a fierce storm, they escaped death by breathing oxygen from a jury-rigged set-up during the night. The next day they climbed to 8100 m at 900 vf/h—nearly three times as fast as non-oxygen users. Yet the use of oxygen was considered so unsportsmanlike that none of the rest of the Alpine world recognised this high ascent rate. George Mallory himself described the use of such oxygen as unsportsmanlike, but he later concluded that it would be impossible for him to summit without it and consequently used it on his final attempt in 1924.  When Tenzing and Hillary made the first successful summit in 1953, they used bottled oxygen, with the expedition's physiologist Griffith Pugh referring to the oxygen debate as a "futile controversy", noting that oxygen "greatly increases subjective appreciation of the surroundings, which after all is one of the chief reasons for climbing."  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. In 1980, Messner summited the mountain solo, without supplemental oxygen or any porters or climbing partners, on the more difficult northwest route. Once the climbing community was satisfied that the mountain could be climbed without supplemental oxygen, many purists then took the next logical step of insisting that is how it should be climbed. 

The aftermath of the 1996 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 disaster was partially caused by the sheer number of climbers (34 on that day) attempting to ascend, causing bottlenecks at the Hillary Step and delaying many climbers, most of whom summitted after the usual 2 pm 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. 
Guide Anatoli Boukreev's decision not to use bottled oxygen was sharply criticised 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 could not directly help his clients descend.  They state that Boukreev said that he was going down with client Martin Adams, but just below the South Summit, Boukreev determined that Adams was doing fine on the descent and so descended at a faster pace, leaving Adams behind. Adams states in The Climb: "For me, it was business as usual, Anatoli's going by, and I had no problems with that."

The low oxygen can cause a mental fog-like impairment of cognitive abilities described as "delayed and lethargic thought process, clinically defined as bradypsychia" even after returning to lower altitudes. In severe cases, climbers can experience hallucinations. Some studies have found that high-altitude climbers, including Everest climbers, experience altered brain structure. The effects of high altitude on the brain, particularly if it can cause permanent brain damage, continue to be studied.

Autumn climbing

Although generally less popular than spring, Mount Everest has also been climbed in the autumn (also called the "post-monsoon season"). For example, in 2010 Eric Larsen and five Nepali guides summited Everest in the autumn for the first time in ten years. The first mainland British ascent of Mount Everest (Hillary was from New Zealand), led by Chris Bonnington, was an autumn ascent in 1975.  The autumn season, when the monsoon ends, is regarded as more dangerous because there is typically a lot of new snow which can be unstable.  However, this increased snow can make it more popular with certain winter sports like skiing and snow boarding. Two Japanese summited in October 1973 also.  Chris Chandler and Bob Cormack summited Everest in October 1976 as part of the American Bicentennial Everest Expedition that year, the first Americans to make an autumn ascent of Mt. Everest according to the Los Angeles Times.  By the 21st century, summer and autumn can be more popular with skiing and snowboard attempts on Mount Everest.  During the 1980s, climbing in autumn was actually more popular than in spring.  The U.S. astronaut Karl Gordon Henize died in October 1993 on a fall (autumn) expedition conducting an experiment on radiation. The amount of background radiation increases with higher altitudes. 

The mountain has also been climbed in the winter, but that is not popular because of the combination of cold high winds and shorter days.  By January the peak is typically battered by 170 mph winds and the average temperature of the summit is around -33 °F (-36 °C).

Selected climbing records

By the end of the 2010 climbing season, there had been 5,104 ascents to the summit by about 3,142 individuals.  Some notable "firsts" by climbers include: 
* 1922 – First climb to 8000 m, by George Finch and Captain Geoffrey Bruce 
* 1952 – First climb to South Col by 1952 Swiss Mount Everest expedition
* 1953 – First ascent, by Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary on 1953 British Mount Everest expedition
* 1960 – First reported ascent from the North Ridge by Wang Fuzhou, Gonpo and Qu Yinhua of China.
* 1975 – First female ascent, by Junko Tabei (16 May).
* 1975 - First female ascent from the North Ridge, by Phanthog, deputy head of the second Chinese Everest expedition that sent nine climbers to the summit (27 May).    
* 1978 – First ascent without supplemental oxygen by Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler 
* 1980 – First solo ascent, by Reinhold Messner
* 1980 – First winter ascent, by Leszek Cichy and Krzysztof Wielicki
* 1988 – First "cross-over" climb by Chinese, Japanese and Nepalese teams which ascended the peak simultaneously from both the North and South sides of the mountain and descended down the other side.  The cross-over climb was also the first to be recorded on live broadcast television.
* 1988 – First descent by paraglider, by Jean-Marc Boivin 
* 1988 – First female ascent without supplemental oxygen by Lydia Bradey 
* 1998 – Fastest to reach the summit via the southeast ridge (South Col), without supplemental oxygen, by Kazi Sherpa, in 20 hours and 24 minutes.   
* 2000 – First descent by ski by Davo Karničar 
* 2001 – First ascent by a blind climber, Erik Weihenmayer 
* 2001 - Lhakpa Sherpa becomes first Nepali woman to summit Everest and survive. 
* 2004 – Fastest to reach the summit via the southeast ridge (South Col), with supplemental oxygen, by Pemba Dorje, in 8 hours and 10 minutes. 
* 2006 - Lhakpa Sherpa summits for the 6th time, breaking her own record for most successful female Everest climber. 
* 2007 – Fastest to reach the summit via the northeast ridge, without supplemental oxygen, by Christian Stangl, in 16 hours, 42 minutes. 
* 2010 – Youngest to reach the summit, by Jordan Romero (13-year-old) 
* 2011 - Most times to reach the summit, Apa Sherpa (21 times; 10 May 1990 – 11 May 2011)
*2013 – Apa Sherpa tied for most times to reach the summit by Phurba Tashi (21 times; 1999–2013)
* 2013 - Melissa Arnot, American, summits for the 5th time breaking her own record for most successful summits by any non-Sherpa woman. 

Summiting with disabilities

Summiting Everest with disabilities such as amputations and diseases has become popular in the 21st century, with stories like that of Sudarshan Gautam, a man with no arms who made it to the top in 2013.  A teenager with Down's syndrome made it to Base camp, which has become a substitute for more extreme record-breaking because it carries many of the same thrills including the trip to the Himalayas and rustic scenery.  Danger lurks even at base camp though, which was the site where dozens were killed in the 2015 Mount Everest avalanches. Others that have climbed Everest with amputations include Mark Inglis (no legs), Paul Hockey (1 arm only), and Arunima Sinha (1 leg).

Everest and aviation

1988: First climb and glide

On 26 September 1988, having climbed the mountain via the south-east ridge, Jean-Marc Boivin made the first paraglider descent of Everest,   in the process creating the record for the fastest descent of the mountain and the highest paraglider flight. Boivin said: "I was tired when I reached the top because I had broken much of the trail, and to run at this altitude was quite hard." Boivin ran 60 ft from below the summit on 40-degree slopes to launch his paraglider, reaching Camp II at 19400 ft in 12 minutes (some sources say 11 minutes). Boivin would not repeat this feat, as he was killed two years later in 1990, base-jumping off Venezuela's Angel Falls. 

1991: Hot air balloon flyover

In 1991 four men in two balloons achieved the first hot-air balloon flight over Mount Everest.   In one balloon was Andy Elson and Eric Jones (cameraman), and in the other balloon Chris Dewhirst and Leo Dickinson (cameraman).  Leo went on to write a book about the adventure called Ballooning Over Everest. The hot-air balloons were modified to function at up to 40,000 feet altitude. Reinhold Messner called one of Leo's panoramic views of Everest, captured on the now discontinued Kodak Kodachrome film, the "best snap on Earth", according to UK newspaper The Telegraph.  Dewhirst has offered to take passengers on a repeat of this feat for 2.6 million USD per passenger.

2005: Pilot summits Everest with helicopter

In May 2005, pilot Didier Delsalle of France landed a Eurocopter AS350 B3 helicopter on the summit of Mount Everest.  He needed to land for two minutes to set the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) official record, but he stayed for about four minutes, twice. In this type of landing the rotors stay engaged, which avoids relying on the snow to fully support the aircraft. The flight set rotorcraft world records, for highest of both landing and take-off.

Some press reports suggested that the report of the summit landing was a misunderstanding of a South Col landing, but he had also landed on South Col two days earlier, with this landing and the Everest records confirmed by the FAI.  Delsalle also rescued two Japanese climbers at 16000 ft while he was there. One climber noted that the new record meant a better chance of rescue.

2011 Paraglide off summit

In 2011 two Nepali paraglided from the Everest Summit to Namche in 42 minutes. They had run out of oxygen and supplies, so it was a very fast way off the Mountain. The duo won National Geographic Adventurers of the Year for 2012 for their exploits.  After the paraglide they kayaked to the Indian Ocean, and they had made it to the Bay of Bengal by the end of June 2011. One had never climbed, and one had never para-glided, but together they accomplished a ground-breaking feat. By 2013 footage of the flight was shown on the television Nightline.  (see also Kayaking for more on this style of activity)

2014: Helicopter assisted ascent

In 2014 one team used a helicopter to fly from South base camp to Camp 2 to avoid the Khumbu Icefall, then reached the Everest summit. This team had to use the south side because the Chinese had denied them a permit to climb. Ultimately, Chinese reluctance may have been beneficial to Nepalese interests, allowing the government to showcase improved local hospitals and the opportunity for a new hybrid aviation/mountaneering stylewhich sparked conversations about helicopter use in the mountaineering world. Nepal ended up investigating Wang, and she denied the charge but admitted she did fly some support crew over the Khumbu Icefall to Camp 2 using a helicopter.  National Geographic noted how a village festooned Wang with honors after she donated 30,000 USD to the town's hospital.  Wang won International Mountaineer of the Year Award from the Nepal government in June 2014.

2016: Helicopter business increases

In 2016 the increased use of helicopters was noted for increased efficiency and for hauling materiel over the deadly Khumbu icefall.  In particular it was noted that flights saved icefall porters 80 trips but still increased commercial activity at Everest. After many Nepal died in the icefall in 2014, the government had wanted helicopters to handle more transportation to Camp 1 but this was not possible because of the 2015 deaths and earthquake closing the mountain, so the this was implemented in 2016 (helicopters did prove instrumental in rescuing many people in 2015 though). That summer Bell tested the 412EPI, which conducted a series of tests including hovering at 18,000 feet and flying as high as 20,000 feet altitude near Mount Everest. 

Financial cost of guided climbs

Going with a "celebrity guide", usually a well-known mountaineer typically with decades of climbing experience and perhaps multiple Everest summits, can cost over £100,000 as of 2015.  On the other hand, a limited support service, offering only some meals at base camp and bureaucratic overhead like a permit, can be as little as 7,000 USD. There are issues with the management of guiding firms in Nepal, and one Canadian woman was left begging for help when her guide firm, which she had paid perhaps 40,000 dollars to, couldn't stop her from dying in 2012. She ran out of bottled oxygen after climbing for 27 hours straight. Despite decades of concern over inexperienced climbers, neither she nor the guide firm had summited Everest before. The communist-controlled Tibetan/Chinese side does not offer much reprieve from the chaos, with it being described as "out of control" due to multiple reports of thefts, threats, etc. By 2015, Nepal was considering requiring that summiters have some experience and wanted to make the mountain safer, and especially increase revenue.  One barrier to this is that low-budget firms make money not taking inexperienced climbers to the summit.  Those turned away by western firms can often find another firm willing to take them for a pricethat they return home soon after arriving after base camp, or part way up the mountain. Whereas a western firm will convince those they deem incapable to turn back, other firms simply give people the freedom to choose. Mountain managers can be left with difficult choices, sometimes balancing greed with the safety of tourists; as one bureaucrat for the extremely popular Mont Blanc put it, "Climbing the Mont Blanc is a matter for serious mountaineers. It isn't a trek or a playground to get a mention in the Guinness World Records"  Mount Blanc may be an indicator of how extreme Everest can go, a mountain that dwarfs Everest in popularity and fatalities, with tens of thousands, not hundreds summiting a commensurate increase in fatalities, with over a hundred dying each year.  The battle for safety is a struggle there as in the Himalaya's, with another official jokingly noting they want to send Pamela Anderson to rescue tourists (perhaps a nod to her role as a life-guard on the U.S. television show Baywatch).

Commercial climbing

Climbing Mount Everest can be a relatively expensive undertaking for climbers. Climbing gear required to reach the summit may cost in excess of US$8,000, and most climbers also use bottled oxygen, which adds around US$3,000. The permit to enter the Everest area from the south via Nepal costs US$10,000 to US$25,000 per person, depending on the size of the team. The ascent typically starts in one of the two base camps near the mountain, both of which are approximately 100 km from Kathmandu and 300 km from Lhasa (the two nearest cities with major airports); transferring one's equipment from the airport to the base camp may add as much as US$2,000.

By 2016, most guiding services cost between 35 and almost 200 thousand dollars. However, the services offered vary widely and its "buyer beware" when doing deals in Nepal, one of the poorest and least developed countries in the World.  Tourism is about 4% of Nepal's economy, but Everest is special in that an Everest porter can make nearly double the nations's average wage in a region in which other sources of income have been slow coming. 

Beyond this point, costs may vary widely. It is technically possible to reach the summit with minimal additional expenses, and there are "budget" travel agencies which offer logistical support for such trips. However, this is considered difficult and dangerous (as illustrated by the case of David Sharp). Many climbers hire "full service" guide companies, which provide a wide spectrum of services, including acquisition of permits, transportation to/from base camp, food, tents, fixed ropes,  medical assistance while on the mountain, an experienced mountaineer guide, and even personal porters to carry one's backpack and cook one's meals. The cost of such a guide service may range from $40,000 to $80,000 per person.  Since most equipment is moved by Sherpas, clients of full-service guide companies can often keep their backpack weights under 10 kg, or hire a Sherpa to carry their backpack for them. By contrast, climbers attempting less commercialised peaks, like Denali, are often expected to carry backpacks over 30 kg and, occasionally, to tow a sled with 35 kg of gear and food. 

According to Jon Krakauer, the era of commercialization of Everest started in 1985, when the summit was reached by a guided expedition led by David Breashears that included Richard Bass, a wealthy 55-year-old businessman and an amateur mountain climber with only four years of climbing experience.  By the early 1990s, multiple companies were offering guided tours to the mountain. Rob Hall, one of the mountaineers who died in the 1996 disaster, had successfully guided 39 clients to the summit prior to that incident. 

The degree of commercialization of Mount Everest is a frequent subject of criticism. Jamling Tenzing Norgay, the son of Tenzing Norgay, said in a 2003 interview that his late father would have been shocked to discover that rich thrill-seekers with no climbing experience were now routinely reaching the summit:

Reinhold Messner concurred in 2004:

However, not all opinions on the subject among prominent mountaineers are strictly negative. For example, Edmund Hillary, who went on record saying that he has not liked "the commercialization of mountaineering, particularly of Mt. Everest"  and claimed that "Having people pay $65,000 and then be led up the mountain by a couple of experienced guides ... isn't really mountaineering at all",  nevertheless noted that he was pleased by the changes brought to Everest area by the Westerners:

One of the early guided summiters, Richard Bass (of Seven Summits fame) responded in an interview about Everest climbers and what it took to survive there:

Law and order struggles

Some 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.  

In addition to theft, Michael Kodas describes in his book High Crimes: The Fate of Everest in an Age of Greed (2008),  unethical guides and Sherpas, prostitution and gambling at the Tibet Base Camp, fraud related to the sale of oxygen bottles, and climbers collecting donations under the pretense of removing trash from the mountain.  

The Chinese side of the Everest in Tibet was called "out of countrol" after one Canadian had all his gear stolen and was abandoned by his Sherpa. Another sherpa helped him get off the mountain safely and gave him some spare gear. Other climbers have also noted missing oxygen bottles, which can be worth hundreds of dollars each. One of the problems is that there are hundreds of climbers passing by people's tents, although the weather can also damage or even blow people's equipment away.

2014 Sherpa strike

On 18 April 2014, in one of the worst disasters to ever hit the Everest climbing community up to that time, 16 Sherpas died in Nepal due to the avalanche that swept them off Mount Everest. In response to the tragedy numerous Sherpa climbing guides walked off the job and most climbing companies pulled out in respect for the Sherpa people mourning the loss.  Some still wanted to climb but there was really too much controversy to continue that year. One of the issues that was triggered was pre-existing resentment that had been building over unreasonable client requests during climbs. As bad as it was, the death toll was surpassed later that year by the 2014 Nepal snowstorm disaster.

Extreme sports at Mount Everest

Mount Everest has been host to other winter sports and adventuring besides mountaineering, including snowboarding, skiing, paragliding, and BASE jumping.

Yuichiro Miura became the first man to ski down Everest in the 1970s (he descended nearly 4,200 vertical feet from the South Col before falling with extreme injuries). Stefan Gatt and Marco Siffredi snowboarded Mount Everest in 2001.  Other famous Everest skiers include Davo Karničar of Slovenia, who completed a top to south base camp descent in 2000, Hans Kammerlander of Italy in 1996 on the north side,  and Kit DesLauriers of the United States in 2006. In 2006 Tomas Olsson planned to ski down the North face, but his anchor broke while he was rappelling down a cliff in the Norton couloir at about 8500 meters, resulting in his death from a two and a half kilometer fall. Also, Marco Siffredi died in 2002 on his second snow-boarding expedition.

Various types of gliding descents have slowly become more popular, and are noted for their rapid descents to lower camps. In 1986 Steve McKinney led an expedition to Mount Everest,  during which he became the first person to fly a hang-glider off the mountain. Frenchman Jean-Marc Boivin made the first paraglider descent of Everest in September 1988, descending in minutes from the south-east ridge to a lower camp. In 2011, two Nepalese made a gliding descent from the Everest summit down  in 45 minutes.  On 5 May 2013, the beverage company Red Bull sponsored Valery Rozov, who successfully BASE jumped off of the mountain while wearing a wingsuit, setting a record for world's highest BASE jump in the process. 

Everest and religion

The southern part of Mt. Everest is regarded as one of several "hidden valleys" of refuge designated by Padmasambhava, a ninth-century "lotus-born" Buddhist saint.

Near the base of the north side of Mt. Everest lies Rongbuk Monastery, which has been called the "sacred threshold to Mount Everest, with the most dramatic views of the world."  For Sherpas living on the slopes of Everest in the Khumbu region of Nepal, Rongbuk Monastery was an important pilgrimage site, accessed in a few days of travel across the Himalaya through Nangpa La. 

Miyolangsangma, a Tibetan Buddhist "Goddess of Inexhaustible Giving", is believed to have lived at the top of Mt. Everest. According to Sherpa Buddhist monks, Mt. Everest is Miyolangsangma's palace and playground, and all climbers are only partially welcome guests, having arrived without invitation.

The Sherpa people also believe that Mt. Everest and its flanks are blessed with spiritual energy, and one should show reverence when passing through this sacred landscape. Here, the karmic effects of one's actions are magnified, and impure thoughts are best avoided. 

Debris management

Former long-time Everest guide and climber Apa Sherpa noted the increased amount of items left by expeditions. Apa organised an expedition to remove  of rubbish from the lower part of the mountain and another  from higher areas. Removal of things from Everest can be quite dangerous, and in one mission two died trying to remove a single corpse, actually increasing the number of dead bodies on Everest.

The Mount Everest Biogas Project aims to make a bioreactor for converting compost material,  especially faeces, into a gas maker.  One of the challenges of getting a digester to work near Everest is the cold temperatures which have made it harder to work.  The project would install a device at Everest that converts human waste into methane, which can then be used as fuel (for heating, etc.). 

Names

*Peak XV (British Empire's Survey)
*"The Bastard" (Hillary) 
*Romanised Tibetan name: "Chomolongma".    
*Romanised Chinese name: "Mount Qomolangma",
*Romanised Nepalese name: "Sagar-Matha" (Usually Sagarmatha)
*Old Darjeeling name: "Deodungha"
*Mount Everest
*Gauri Shankar, in modern times the name a different peak about 30 miles away, but until about 1900 was also sometimes used. 

Maps

File:Himalaya_annotated.jpg|center|thumb|600px|Southern and northern climbing routes as seen from the International Space Station. (The names on the photo are links to corresponding pages.)
rect 58 14 160 49 58 14 160 49 58 14 160 49 Chomo Lonzo
rect 200 28 335 52 Makalu
rect 378 24 566 45 Everest
rect 188 581 920 656 Tibetan Plateau
rect 250 406 340 427 Rong River
rect 333 149 409 186 Changtse
rect 550 284 677 303 Rongbuk Glacier
rect 478 196 570 218 North Face (Everest)
rect 237 231 346 267 East Rongbuk Glacier
rect 314 290 536 309 North Col north ridge route
rect 531 79 663 105 Lhotse
rect 582 112 711 130 Nuptse
rect 603 232 733 254 South Col route
rect 716 165 839 206 Gyachung Kang
rect 882 147 967 183 Cho Oyu
rect 1 1 999 661 

desc bottom-left

From China (Tibet region)

From Gokyo Ri

Terrain animation
Climb Everest
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Climb Everest
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