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THE BODIES OF four climbers were found inside a tent on Everest, an expedition organiser said today, taking the death toll on the world’s highest peak this spring season to 10.
The climbers were found at camp four – at 7,950 metres (26,085 feet) – yesterday by a rescue team who were there to retrieve the body of a Slovak climber who died on the mountain on Sunday.
“Our rescuers found bodies of four climbers in a tent at camp four yesterday. We don’t have the details of who they are or how they died yet,” said Mingma Sherpa, head of Seven Summits Trek, a Kathmandu-based agency that runs expeditions and rescue operations on the mountain.
Local media reported that two of the dead were foreign climbers and two were Sherpa guides.
The Nepal government liaison officer stationed at base camp could not immediately be reached for confirmation.
Four people perished on the 8,848 metre peak over the weekend, including American doctor Roland Yearwood and Slovak climber Vladimir Strba.
Both died above the 8,000 metre mark – an area known as the mountain’s “death zone” where oxygen levels fall to dangerously low levels, heightening the risk of altitude sickness.
The body of Indian climber Ravi Kumar, 27, was spotted on Monday, two days after he reached the summit and then lost contact. A rescue operation is currently under way to retrieve his body.
An Australian climber died on the Tibet side of the mountain on Sunday.
This season has also claimed the lives of legendary Swiss climber Ueli Steck and 85-year-old Min Bahadur Sherchan, who died attempting to reclaim his title as the world’s oldest person to climb Everest.
More than 382 climbers have successfully reached the summit from the south side so far this season, with at least 120 doing so from the Tibet side.
Many are still waiting to make their final push to the summit before the monsoon arrives in early June, marking the end of the short spring climbing season.
Last year Everest claimed the lives of five climbers. In all, 640 people reached the summit.
Irish man John Burke successfully managed to climb the world’s highest mountain last week, and described his final night as “hell on earth”.
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When are people going to cop on. We are destroying Everest . It’s littered with bodies and used oxygen tanks. It’s been climbed get over it .
@Nigel cronly: but you have to climb over it in order to get over it. I suppose we could try to get under it or get around it.
@Darren Tully: ha ha they said that shit about the motorway going through the hill of Tara. Now the same hypocrites are speeding up and down the M3 at lightning speed.
I guess some people see it as a challenge to complete in life instead of just tweeting from the couch
@Minom Pnom: I agree with you Minom. There’s also no better way to die than climbing a mountain. But not Everest, it’s like Disney World now. If Nepal was responsible it would would sharply cut permits, hugely raise the prices on half and raffle the other half off to applicants perhaps weighted by an independent climbing metric system. That way you get less climbers, still get the revenue, probably reduce deaths and you have a real shot at cleaning it up.
@Seán J. Troy: Nepal already charges $11,000 just for the permit. Raising the price would just make it even more elitist. When you factor in the cost of a guided expedition etc you’re looking at anywhere from $70,000 to $100,000+
@Nigel cronly: It’s natural selection in action.
@Minom Pnom: I hope you’re tweeting from basecamp,otherwise…
RIP
Have we not enough mountains to climb by just living?
I never thought these people were heros in the real sense of the word!
More egotistical maybe!
What about they’re families? Imagine the worry they feel from the time they decide to train to do this climb!
Steck, died in Uptse not Everest different mountain!
@Wayne O’Fathaigh:
Nuptse, but it’s part of the Everest massif and is usually regarded as an outlying peak rather than a separate mountain due to its lack of topographic prominence.
@Wayne O’Fathaigh: Im sure getting the details pedantically right will be important to his next of kin.
@Jonathan Morgan: don’t be silly. He’s every right to correct a school boy error.
@Wayne O’Fathaigh: Nuptse
RIP but let’s get real, Everest is a circus at this stage, inexperienced climbers paying natives to carry them and their shit up the mountain pounding bottle after bottle of oxygen, the great days of conquering this mountain are well and truly behind us
Rest in Peace, to all those who died trying to get to the Highest Point in the World..
@Fay Fitzgerald: yeah real heroes or reckless morons depending on your point of view
There must be a way to design a craft that can somehow recover all these bodies safely. At least for starters climbers should be able to place some kind of solar powered markers on the bodies for location.
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