Posts tagged Chomolungma

Mapped: The deadly geography of Mount Everest

Some bodies are known landmarks, as Green Boots used to be: “The German” on the second step of the north face route, the “Saluting Man” near the south summit, the “Icefall Body”, in the Khumbu glacier field, and “Sleeping Beauty” on the southeast ridge, until she too was removed from view in 2007.

Zooming out from individual casualties to the overall death toll, the dead of Everest start to form a morbid geography of sorts, which does more than simply horrify. As these maps show, patterns emerge, and lessons can be learned.

The most obvious one is from the sheer number of dead: to be highly motivated is not enough. To climb Everest and make it down alive, you must also come highly trained and prepared, be of sound mind and judgment, and have an appreciable dose of good luck.

(via https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/everest-deaths/ )

People have been following ghosts up Mount Everest ever since George Mallory and Sandy Irvine vanished on the mountain’s flanks in 1924. A front-row look at death is part of the allure: you climb in order to taste mortality and, should all go according to plan, defeat it. Following many of the highly publicized tragedies, including the deadly Into Thin Air events of 1996, the number of commercial outfitters on the mountain has actually increased. After the 2006 season, in which 11 people died, the number of Everest climbers increased from 447 to 572. “There’s always been a disaster mystique,” said Jennifer Peedom, director of the 2016 documentary Sherpa, who spent three seasons filming on the mountain. “The worse things that happen, the more people come.” The fact that inexperienced climbers could join the parade, given the lack of regulation, only contributed to the chaos, creating a deadly feedback loop.

via http://www.outsideonline.com/2064481/david-morton-and-ghosts-everest?src=longreads