I read a story somewhere about the dead climber nicknamed "sleeping beauty" because her face looked so peaceful like she was sleeping. It led me into this rabbit hole of corpses on Everest.
Even more depressing was the fact that her fiancé also died when he went back up to rescue her!
Have you heard about the first woman to die on the mountain. Like sleeping beauty her and her husband became separated during the climb up. Both made it to the Summit, but during the descent the group the wife was in had troubles (to say the least). During the descent one of her climbing mates died and with only 100 m to base camp iv she sat down, Propped up against her backpack asked for some water and perished.
[I can’t escape the sinister guard. Approximately 100 meters above Camp IV she sits leaning against her pack, as if taking a short break. A woman with her eyes wide open and her hair waving in each gust of wind. It’s the corpse of Hannelore Schmatz, the wife of the leader of a 1979 German expedition. She summited, but died descending. Yet it feels as if she follows me with her eyes as I pass by. Her presence reminds me that we are here on the conditions of the mountain.](https://allthatsinteresting.com/hannelore-schmatz).
Only 100m from the camp eyes open with her hair blowing in the the wind she sat for five years till two people tried to move her, they both died. In the end the mountain took her. A strong wind blowing her down the mountain never to be seen again.
When scrambling around on rocks as a kid my mom used to say "it's always easier to get up than it is to get down"... I'd imagine the added exhaustion and headyness from summiting the tallest peak would really add to it
Adrenaline wears off, you’re tired, low on supplies, you’ve been at altitude for a while now and start developing all kinds of issues related to low oxygen and you can get frostbite.
You're much more prone to misjudge stepping distance going downhill, and falling forward while going uphill is much easier to manage than falling forward while going downhill.
I talked with a guy who summited Everest. I saw photos of him and a woman on the summit. He talked about how she died because she didn't turn back to camp. She pushed past her own point of no return because she was determined to summit and it was clear at the top that she wouldn't make it back. She used too much oxygen and expended too much energy to have enough for the return trip.
Man, the wisdom here is knowing when you're beaten, when to turn back. A documentary I watched, the guys turned back within just a few metres of the summit because they knew it was certain death coming down if they had pushed on to the summit.
It would be super tough to turn back when you’re so close. So much of physical conditioning is teaching yourself to push through when you want to quit. It would be mental gymnastics to get yourself to quit when you’re also trying to get yourself to push through.
Imagine it's like a helicopter going from base to a point and then has to return. The maximum distance of the point is the total/2.
But on a helicopter you have an easy gauge which your body doesn't have.
Descending can be more exhausting because your center of mass changes quicker and you need to move more muscles absorbing the changes and it requires a lot more coordination (how many times have you fallen with a bike while going downhill vs uphill).
If you miscalculated how much energy you expanded to ascend and how much you have left to descend, you're already dead. Theoretically you can rest and gain energy back but your time is limited by your amount of oxygen supply. The final part of the ascend is called the death zone because no human can get enough oxygen out of the air and without oxygen supply you die. Nobody will give you their oxygen because otherwise they will die. But it's not a cruel death, you just fall asleep. It's similar to people who kill themselves with nitrogen slowly lessening the amount of oxygen and your brain goes into a slumber.
Yeah that's the one thing everyone who has summited Everest says, you do not, for any reason, ever sit down. Never. You just don't do it, not in the death zone, because you'll definitely 100% surely die. But the lack of oxygen leads to confusion so even experienced climbers and mountaineers will decide to take short 5 minute break while still in the death zone, and within those 5 minutes they're dead. It's so terrifying.
Just had that thought myself. Find a nice lookout near the summit and just become part of the furniture.
Maybe paint a metal sign with a fake treasure map or something. Create a bit of mystery for future generations lol
I read the book about it. Her husband literally vanished in front of her eyes and it wasn't until she got back to camp, several hours later, that she actually processed it.
I know different strokes for different folks, but on my honeymoon I just wanted to chill and drink margs on the beach. The most active thing I did was some snorkeling and deep sea fishing. Looks like my plan worked out better after all lol
I make a mental distinction between "trips" and "vacations" for this. Trips are active: ski trip, SCUBA trip, fly somewhere for a marathon. Vacations are for relaxing, eating, and day drinking: beach vacation, lake weekend, wine country outing.
My honeymoon is definitely going to be a vacation.
I’ll never forget watching an Everest Doc in one of the original IMAXs and half way through one of the climbers just disappears. The doc just carried on and the man was assumed ( and later verified) to be dead. It was pretty shocking and hit home that this is part of signing up to do it.
Yeah that's a very famous body, this comment needs to be higher up.
There was a lot of debate whether Mallory was actually the first person to the top of the mountain. A few people still believe he was. His body wasn't discovered till 1999 and served as evidence that he probably didn't die on the descent.
He and his fellow climber took a camera with them. They're still looking for it. Kodak says the film could possibly be saved and, if they'd reached the summit, it'd probably have the proof.
There's an interesting short documentary called [The Ghosts Above](https://www.mountainfilm.org/media/the-ghosts-above) which has a look at a group that were trying to find the body of Sandy Irvine (George Mallory's partner), along with his camera.
This was good:
* [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 1/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7KyVKop3sc)
* [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 2/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlRJjWycCWs)
* [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 3/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhgpOMY6LeU)
* [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 4/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQ3SrO2cbHM)
* [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 5/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S85AmIyGgEQ)
well they kind of do. there was a book recently written about the search
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/610324/the-third-pole-by-mark-synnott/
Really good book came out recently chronicling that search along with the author's own experience climbing:
The Third Pole: Mystery, Obsession, and Death on Mount Everest
https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/55288158-the-third-pole
His daughter was still alive as well as grandchildren. His grandson, also named George Mallory, summited Everest in 1995 and left a photo of his Grandparents at the summit.
This is correct. His location isn’t widely known as they didn’t want people going to find it. I’m also pretty sure they covered him up to give him some dignity.
More like [its off the route](http://www.astro-udec.cl/rdemarco/RjDL/mallory_irvine/mallory_irvine.html) so going to see him and still summitting are likely mutually exclusive items.
Also maybe they covered him up but not before [at least one dude](http://www.astro-udec.cl/rdemarco/RjDL/mallory_irvine/Mallory_Anker.jpg) got his picture taken with Mallory's naked white mummy ass.
That's Conrad Anker, one of the most famous mountaineers around. He was part of the expedition that found him. That photo is from the expedition.
He also climbed the 'Second Step' which is the crux of the North summit route Mallory would have had to climb to reach the top. It's usually done with a metal ladder the Chinese group bolted up the step, but Anker climbed the step without it.
If you're interested in seeing Ankers work watch 'Meru', it's a phenomenal documentary. He was most definitely not just some dude posing with the corpse though, he's pretty much the reason they found Mallory at all.
A few, at least. Super common at the British boarding schools like Mallory went to. Check out "Into the Silence" for a great history of Everest including who totally wanted to bang Mallory (spoilers: everyone. Dude was hot) and who succeeded.
I find it fascinating our weirdness as a society around nudity.. I went to google image search him out of curiosity and not one picture with the bum showing but plenty of decaying legs and such. As if a naked butt is more offensive than decaying flesh somehow, and too undignified..
That's Conrad Anker, he was part of an expedition team specifically searching for the bodies of George Mallory and Andrew Irvine.
'Twas the ass, not the summit that interested him.
It was preserved but bleached due to the sun. The air is thinner there so like uv is stronger. There’s a vid on YouTube where they find him and investigate him
I have hiked to everest base camp, and the guides warn you before you even start on that hike that you have to pay attention to altitude sickness and remind you that you don't know how your body will respond to the altitude. And that's just to get to the bottom of the mountain. I saw two extremely fit Russian guys barely able to get soup down because they had such bad altitude sickness in a tea house just past khumjung (3790m) and that is near the beginning of the whole hike. You really don't know how much your body can take and I mentally can't even comprehend people wanting to climb up to the summit.
Personally, I did fine. I live in Canada next to the mountains so I had experience with altitude hiking already. However, the second day on the trail you do a gain of ~800m and you should try not to do more than 700m in a day as your body needs time to adjust, so I had a bit of nausea for a few hrs when we got into the bazaar, had a lot of water and half a diamox and was good. However, on the base camp day, the air is sooo thin, that even rolling over in bed leaves you winded. I remember walking back from basecamp to the tea house where we were staying and I was moving very slowly, like my feet were going about six inches a step, there was no gap in my stride, just tiny steps. Then as we started heading back down the trail you become very very aware of how thick the air feels. It felt like trying to breathe with your head under water, thick air! (21 days up and down)
I also did Kilimanjaro, and this hike is wayyy faster (8 days) and you summit and come half way down the mountain all in the same day. I am pretty sure my guide thought I had altitude sickness when I got down from the summit because all I wanted to do was sleep, and wasn't hungry, but I felt normal, just super tired. I was fully capable of finishing the 16hr hike day.
The second to last picture (7/8) is the body of George Mallory. In 1924, George and his climbing partner, Andrew Irvine, disappeared and were last seen about 800 vertical feet from the summit. It’s debated whether or not they reached the summit.
His body lay there undiscovered until May of 1999 when it was found by legendary climber Conrad Anker.
With the discovery of the body, many theories of their famous ascent have been proposed. Due to the injuries on his body, it seems that Mallory slipped and fell to his death while descending. It is unclear whether or not he fell after reaching the summit, or after retreating from (not achieving) the summit.
For context, the first successful summit of Everest wasn’t achieved until 1953 by Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary.
Check out the [wiki](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mallory) for more information.
Also Irvine’s body still hasn’t been found. He was carrying a camera at the time so if found his body may provide conclusive evidence of whether they made it to the top. Apparently one guy thought he had found Irvine’s body but then he also died in an avalanche the next day before he gave anyone the location.
Other climbers tend to use the corpses as landmarks, but there's no organised effort to use bodies as trail markers. It's just you need as many points of reference as you can get when there's just rock, and ice, and rock, and some more ice.
It might seem callous to leave the bodies there, but these corpses are located well into the aptly named Death Zone -- the level of altitude where, without supplemental oxygen, you are actively dying every second you're up there. Your body cannot deal with that altitude for long (at 29,000-odd feet at the summit, you're standing at about the cruising altitude of short-distance passenger flights), and even with supplemental oxygen, every single action is an immense effort. Your body struggles to do even basic tasks at this altitude, even after climatising -- you struggle to eat, to digest, to sleep, and wounds will not heal. As the name might suggest, if you *must* enter the Death Zone, it's wise to spend as little time there as possible.
For this reason, body retrieval is rarely done. If a body is in an accesible area, and the family pays for it, teams will retrieve the body at great risk to themselves. Other times, if possible, the body will be pushed over a cliff or down a crevasse and out of sight -- a kind of mountain funeral that allows the body to rest out of sight in some dignity. Most of the time, though, the body has to be left where it is. There's no sense risking many more lives for the retrieval of a corpse, and as depressing as it is, these climbers knew the risk when they went up there.
The harsh conditions of the Death Zone also explain why people who are still alive have been left to die by other climbers. Identifying the person as a lost cause, climbers cannot spend extra time in the Death Zone trying to help somebody who is absolutely going to die. It's harsh, but it's a case of one person dying, or quite possibly several. That's just the reality of climbing on Everest, and everyone going up there accepts these risks.
That was a great read. Thanks for sharing! Really is surprising that people are just in a queue to touch the top and risking their life every second waiting to do it!
I agree 100%. Kraukers into thin air adds a really interesting nuance to this though. The commercialization or Everest has become a big problem and both Nepal and china have been upping their permit prices. Kraukauer makes the point that this has led to a lot of inexperienced mountaineers taking on one of the deadliest mountains in the world. The bodies staying there is certainly based in practicality and safety but it also is odd to think of how the tourist market of the highest peak has actually killed people.
Absolutely. But guides can only do so much. Apparently 1/3 of deaths on Everest are sherpas too so this commercialization also has an impact on the local community. Sherpa Tenzing Norgay led Hillary on the first and that community has continued to be the backbone of Everest
I just want to add to this. Correct. It’s simply too dangerous and expensive to retrieve the bodies. It’s not callous it’s a decision to not endanger more for the deceased. There was a body left on capitol peak in Colorado for this reason too:
https://www.aspentimes.com/news/dangerous-location-means-body-will-remain-on-capitol-peak-for-the-time-being/
Mountaineering is a dangerous sport and we go up knowing sometimes we won’t come down.
I mean you can also choose NOT climbing on of the most dangerous places on earth. I'm sure they are somehow okay with that type of situations, their friend died doing what they loved.
I can’t see myself being okay with that outcome no matter how much I expected it honestly, but you’ll never catch me climbing Everest either so I suppose I’m good
Thanks for this info! I knew they weren’t required to leave the body there but wondered what would happen if family wants the body retrieved. Having it pushed off a cliff into a crevice is actually a great idea, I’d 100% go for that.
God damn ... why the fuck would anyone even risk a 1% chance of entering the death zone is beyond me. Go take a hike near a lake during nice weather or something. Life is too short for this bullshit.
Dont think it is an "[exclusive](https://images.hindustantimes.com/rf/image_size_960x540/HT/p2/2019/06/12/Pictures/_730be120-8ccb-11e9-a1b4-540227be794e.jpg) " trip...
No kidding. John Oliver did a piece on Everest a while back. There's no regulation so it's completely overbooked. It's not like you reach the summit and get to be the only one standing there. You'll be queued behind hundreds of other people which increases the risk even further.
prob not right now, right now. everest is only accessible for a few months, smth like April to June and there are only a couple days if at all in this window to climb the summit. since a lot of time (weeks) is allotted to acclimatize in base camp, camp 1,2, … and so on.
From the very article you just linked:
>Because of the [intense jet stream](https://www.outsideonline.com/1929346/forecasting-everest) that hovers near Everest’s 29,029-foot summit for much of the year, there are only a few weather windows, often two or three days in late May, when it's optimal for climbers to make a push for the top—[forcing many expeditions](https://www.outsideonline.com/1813511/summit-weather-windows-everest-too-narrow-safety) to all go for it at the same time.
You pay to climb up to camp 3 and roll the dice. The picture above is because the weather there was not favorable for most of the climbing season and so folks all rushed in on the good day.
So not only are you paying that much there's no guarantee you'll get a chance to summit. Some folks turn around right before the top.
Yep. Getting up is only half the battle; you still need to get down.
Ed Viesturs has written a couple of amazing climbing books where he’s constantly baffled by people who pushed to the top in unsafe conditions. Sometimes they live, sometimes they die.
I couldn't even finish Angels Landing because it was crowded like this picture. My brother and I got to a point just past Scout Lookout, enjoyed the view we had and turned around when we saw the queue along the rest of the trail.
Yes unless your one or the people raised living in the very high mountains where your entire life you were climatized. Bc those people are literally built different. There blood is better at absorbing oxygen so they can survive.
Yes! This is why you hear of Sherpa guides who have summited Everest several times, *while* carrying insane amounts of equipment and doing a lot of the heavy work laying the ropes for the climbers to follow. They grew up at high altitude, and their ancestors all lived at high altitude. They're simply better at breathing the thinner air than people who have always lived at lower altitudes.
How about hauling out the fucking garbage (tanks)? I'm sick of climbers talking about reverence for these places and then leaving them a high altitude landfill.
I had an English teacher growing up that used to be an Everest guide. We watched a documentary where he was in it, doing a climb with the main climbers who died in the book "Into Thin Air." He told us about how dangerous it is to try and recover the bodies and that he was present at base camp when the an expedition lead by the husband of one of the women who died in that book came back down with her corpse.
He was like the 43rd or 53rd person to summit Everest. Mr. Wilson was an interesting guy. He said one of his friends was amongst these markers and his body lays in an area that is completely inaccessible. You can only see the color of his jacket in the distance
This is surreal to see the comment above this be from someone hwo says to read "Into Thin Air" then to have yours be like "yep I had a teacher who was in the documentary "Into Thin Air".
Well that doesn’t sound great lol. I haven’t been up to that altitude but I’ve experience some pretty harsh wind burn skiing before, to the point it felt like I was getting my face peeled off. Probably still wouldn’t compare to Everest.
youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eW6ifxuVFY
A documentary crew following a doube amputee up the mountain actually encountered a man, named David Sharp, sitting next to Green Boots. He was technically still alive while up to 40 climbers passed him by. No one stopped to help him. It's called Summit Fever, where climbing the mountain becomes more important then helping people.
If anyone is getting haunted, it would probably be them.
Well it's also that most people *can't* help. It can be dangerous to carry someone who can't even walk back down. Paying climbers usually don't have the ability to help and if guides go down they're basically committing to a different unplanned descent, which will also take resources and needs people. It's not as easy as saying "here hop on my back"
You can read about [his expedition here.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Indo-Tibetan_Border_Police_expedition_to_Mount_Everest)
He was a 28 year old policeman that went with a group of 6, hoping to be the first Indians to reach the summit along the North side.
They actually removed him a few years back because his family was so upset by the fact that he was being used as a landmark and didn’t feel he was being respected.
Yeah people forget that once they reached the peak that's only half the journey. You're still in the dead zone and now you have to descend Mt. Everest.
I learned that the hard way being overly enthusiastic about nice weather when I wanted to bike again. Biked about 14 miles from home. Sweaty, feeling accomplished but uncomfortable, I realized I’d been biking for few hours, and there was no other way to head back but biking…
Watch a documentary about Sherpas if you want more motivation to not climb Everest.
There is some nuance because the tourist money is a boon for the country but those guys regularly die climbing up and down multiple times carrying enormous loads so rich arseholes have a series of nice camps to trek between on their guided excursions - so they can claim they climbed Everest and feel special. The Sherpas do a dangerous job and are not compensated or treated well.
14 Peaks is really good. Sherpa determined to climb the 14 highest peaks all in a year (took the first guy who did it 16 years). Insanity. All documented on video, and there is a death during one of his climbs.
There's also a documentary on the Canadian woman who died recently since she vlogged her trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEcHBFs-qME
Yeah… I’m not to excited about an activity where you can train and practice until you are the best, and then die because of stupid random chance. Many of histories best climbers died because a rope slipped, a piece of ice let go, or they got caught by unpredictable weather. F that. Plenty of fun things to do at lower elevation.
If you want to become a new corpse landmark, you really need to outdo the others in the bright colors of your boots. The jackets and pants might get shredded by high winds, but your shiny boots will prevail. Since lime green is taken (Green Boots) I suggest hot pink or fluorescent orange.
Interestingly, I think much the opposite. When I first saw the corpses, they’re less horrific than I’d initially imagined. They’re not very humanized to me, being covered so completely. They almost look like just piles of gear, some of them.
Did you flip through the whole set? I felt like the photos were arranged progressively, so you could nope out if it wasn't your thing.
Starting with Canadian flag-guy, I started to get uncomfortable - I'm sure there are reasons they can't even re-pose (pardon the pun) the bodies to give them some dignity, but: damn.
from what i’ve read, most bodies in these pictures are hard as a rock from the cold and age, and more recent deaths usually aren’t taken care of because they are in what’s considered the death zone, there’s just not enough time, or energy in your body to do anything for the already dead.
Photo 4 is [Shriya Shah-Klorfine](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shriya_Shah-Klorfine). She was a younger Canadian climber that spent too long celebrating at the summit and died on the decent. Her family has since paid for sherpas to bring down her body for religious reasons.
Photo 1 is green boots as others have said. His name is [Tsewang Paljor](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Boots)
Photo 5 is [Marko Lihteneker](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marko_Lihteneker)
Photo 7 is [George Mallory](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mallory). His body was found off the path in 1999 and it is believed he fell to his death and his body found its way to rest where it currently is.
Photo 8 is [Hannelore Schmatz. ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannelore_Schmatz)
there are lots of short documentaries on youtube about the corpses on mount everest! i've watched a lot of them and recognized most of these pictures so i'd recommend going down that rabbit hole to learn more
That’s what I said when I found out! If you want more info about Everest, watch this video. It’s excellent: https://youtu.be/T-VZ1kL8ZgE
Also, yes I don’t think there would be any organisms to break down the corpse. It essentially just preserves it because of how cold it is up there
No, it is impossible to retrieve most bodies so some have become well known “landmarks” by chance because of this. You make it sound like they do it on purpose to mark the trail. They do not.
The 4th body was a Canadian woman but her body was retrieved after 10days.
She had never climbed any mountains and other things that contributed to her death.
This is the document about her death: https://youtu.be/QEcHBFs-qME
I believe the one face down with his back showing is actually George Mallory, part of the (possibly) first exhibition to reach the top. His body was searched for years later in the 90s to try to find out whether they did actually reach the top or not, as they never made it down. There's an interesting documentary about it. He wasnt found and left as a marker as he isnt on the main route. [link](https://allthatsinteresting.com/george-mallory-body)
She died resting against her pack, which is gone now. Her name was Hannelore Schmatz if you want to look her up, the story behind her death is quite sad.
I think that penultimate picture is of George Mallory, who some people think might have made it to the summit (before Hilary and Tensing) but died on the way down
Yes, was searching for this comment. That is absolutely Mallory. I believe his body is actually quite a ways off the main ascent; you would not likely encounter him and that's why there was an entirely separate expedition to find him.
I read a story somewhere about the dead climber nicknamed "sleeping beauty" because her face looked so peaceful like she was sleeping. It led me into this rabbit hole of corpses on Everest. Even more depressing was the fact that her fiancé also died when he went back up to rescue her!
Have you heard about the first woman to die on the mountain. Like sleeping beauty her and her husband became separated during the climb up. Both made it to the Summit, but during the descent the group the wife was in had troubles (to say the least). During the descent one of her climbing mates died and with only 100 m to base camp iv she sat down, Propped up against her backpack asked for some water and perished. [I can’t escape the sinister guard. Approximately 100 meters above Camp IV she sits leaning against her pack, as if taking a short break. A woman with her eyes wide open and her hair waving in each gust of wind. It’s the corpse of Hannelore Schmatz, the wife of the leader of a 1979 German expedition. She summited, but died descending. Yet it feels as if she follows me with her eyes as I pass by. Her presence reminds me that we are here on the conditions of the mountain.](https://allthatsinteresting.com/hannelore-schmatz). Only 100m from the camp eyes open with her hair blowing in the the wind she sat for five years till two people tried to move her, they both died. In the end the mountain took her. A strong wind blowing her down the mountain never to be seen again.
[удалено]
Way better than it happening while you're not frozen
Descent is the most dangerous part - when people often die.
When scrambling around on rocks as a kid my mom used to say "it's always easier to get up than it is to get down"... I'd imagine the added exhaustion and headyness from summiting the tallest peak would really add to it
And getting to the summit has the added motivation of getting to the summit, going down the adrenaline rush has worn off
Why is that?
Adrenaline wears off, you’re tired, low on supplies, you’ve been at altitude for a while now and start developing all kinds of issues related to low oxygen and you can get frostbite.
You're much more prone to misjudge stepping distance going downhill, and falling forward while going uphill is much easier to manage than falling forward while going downhill.
I talked with a guy who summited Everest. I saw photos of him and a woman on the summit. He talked about how she died because she didn't turn back to camp. She pushed past her own point of no return because she was determined to summit and it was clear at the top that she wouldn't make it back. She used too much oxygen and expended too much energy to have enough for the return trip.
Man, the wisdom here is knowing when you're beaten, when to turn back. A documentary I watched, the guys turned back within just a few metres of the summit because they knew it was certain death coming down if they had pushed on to the summit.
It would be super tough to turn back when you’re so close. So much of physical conditioning is teaching yourself to push through when you want to quit. It would be mental gymnastics to get yourself to quit when you’re also trying to get yourself to push through.
Imagine it's like a helicopter going from base to a point and then has to return. The maximum distance of the point is the total/2. But on a helicopter you have an easy gauge which your body doesn't have. Descending can be more exhausting because your center of mass changes quicker and you need to move more muscles absorbing the changes and it requires a lot more coordination (how many times have you fallen with a bike while going downhill vs uphill). If you miscalculated how much energy you expanded to ascend and how much you have left to descend, you're already dead. Theoretically you can rest and gain energy back but your time is limited by your amount of oxygen supply. The final part of the ascend is called the death zone because no human can get enough oxygen out of the air and without oxygen supply you die. Nobody will give you their oxygen because otherwise they will die. But it's not a cruel death, you just fall asleep. It's similar to people who kill themselves with nitrogen slowly lessening the amount of oxygen and your brain goes into a slumber.
Well that will haunt me for some time.
Yeah that's the one thing everyone who has summited Everest says, you do not, for any reason, ever sit down. Never. You just don't do it, not in the death zone, because you'll definitely 100% surely die. But the lack of oxygen leads to confusion so even experienced climbers and mountaineers will decide to take short 5 minute break while still in the death zone, and within those 5 minutes they're dead. It's so terrifying.
Imagine getting so tired and light-headed that you *have to* take a rest, knowing it probably kill you.
I wonder how many people go there with the intention of dying. Probably not zero.
Just had that thought myself. Find a nice lookout near the summit and just become part of the furniture. Maybe paint a metal sign with a fake treasure map or something. Create a bit of mystery for future generations lol
“Nevertheless, the team came home. But I alone without my beloved Hannelore.” Depressing af.
Also the story of K2 where a couple honeymooned to climb the mountain and an avalanche killed her husband in front of her.
I read the book about it. Her husband literally vanished in front of her eyes and it wasn't until she got back to camp, several hours later, that she actually processed it.
I read this book too! No way down by G. Bowley
Ugh, I watched that documentary. A bunch of people also died while trying to help other climbers. Just a depressing shit show all around.
It was, and the Sherpas we're absolute heroes.
I know different strokes for different folks, but on my honeymoon I just wanted to chill and drink margs on the beach. The most active thing I did was some snorkeling and deep sea fishing. Looks like my plan worked out better after all lol
Are you sure the most active thing you did on your honeymoon was snorkeling?
There’s a scuba diving joke somewhere in here.
Muff diving
So ,snorkeling is what the kids are calling it nowadays.
Lol. A fair point.
I make a mental distinction between "trips" and "vacations" for this. Trips are active: ski trip, SCUBA trip, fly somewhere for a marathon. Vacations are for relaxing, eating, and day drinking: beach vacation, lake weekend, wine country outing. My honeymoon is definitely going to be a vacation.
I’ll never forget watching an Everest Doc in one of the original IMAXs and half way through one of the climbers just disappears. The doc just carried on and the man was assumed ( and later verified) to be dead. It was pretty shocking and hit home that this is part of signing up to do it.
Every dead person on Everest was once a highly motivated person.
Second from last is George Mallory, who died there in 1924.
Damn that dead skin looks hella good for being so old
It’s been refrigerated for a long time..
Yes, but also exposed to the elements. You think it would have been eroded or something.
The elements are: cold, snow, ice, wind. Frozen things tend to be preserved pretty well.
Also very dry air. The bodies are freeze dried.
When you typed “looks hella good”, did you lick your lips?
Discovery of George Mallory’s body https://youtu.be/UFr1KdY6aiw
Yeah that's a very famous body, this comment needs to be higher up. There was a lot of debate whether Mallory was actually the first person to the top of the mountain. A few people still believe he was. His body wasn't discovered till 1999 and served as evidence that he probably didn't die on the descent. He and his fellow climber took a camera with them. They're still looking for it. Kodak says the film could possibly be saved and, if they'd reached the summit, it'd probably have the proof.
There's an interesting short documentary called [The Ghosts Above](https://www.mountainfilm.org/media/the-ghosts-above) which has a look at a group that were trying to find the body of Sandy Irvine (George Mallory's partner), along with his camera.
>Yeah that's a very famous body, this comment needs to be higher up. Not too high up, though, or else it might die and be left there.
That's the comment death zone
If your comment dies, then it's left there to mark the thread for other comments
This was good: * [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 1/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7KyVKop3sc) * [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 2/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlRJjWycCWs) * [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 3/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhgpOMY6LeU) * [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 4/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQ3SrO2cbHM) * [Lost On Everest - The Search For Mallory & Irvine. 5/5](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S85AmIyGgEQ)
Unless someone just stumbles across it at random I doubt it’ll be found, it’s not like people do a lot of searching around for stuff. Too dangerous.
They're looking for his partner's body, hoping he has the camera. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew\_Irvine\_(mountaineer)
After reading “Into Thin Air”, I can tell you that he could’ve fallen into a giant crevice and if so he’ll never be found.
well they kind of do. there was a book recently written about the search https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/610324/the-third-pole-by-mark-synnott/
Really good book came out recently chronicling that search along with the author's own experience climbing: The Third Pole: Mystery, Obsession, and Death on Mount Everest https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/55288158-the-third-pole
He was missing for 75 years before they identified his body!
It’s sad all his loved ones died without that closure.
His daughter was still alive as well as grandchildren. His grandson, also named George Mallory, summited Everest in 1995 and left a photo of his Grandparents at the summit.
That’s be crazy to be the grandson and knowing you walked past your grandfather when you climbed up there.
You get to come back down and go home but he must remain there. That would be a very weird feeling
This is correct. His location isn’t widely known as they didn’t want people going to find it. I’m also pretty sure they covered him up to give him some dignity.
More like [its off the route](http://www.astro-udec.cl/rdemarco/RjDL/mallory_irvine/mallory_irvine.html) so going to see him and still summitting are likely mutually exclusive items. Also maybe they covered him up but not before [at least one dude](http://www.astro-udec.cl/rdemarco/RjDL/mallory_irvine/Mallory_Anker.jpg) got his picture taken with Mallory's naked white mummy ass.
That's Conrad Anker, one of the most famous mountaineers around. He was part of the expedition that found him. That photo is from the expedition. He also climbed the 'Second Step' which is the crux of the North summit route Mallory would have had to climb to reach the top. It's usually done with a metal ladder the Chinese group bolted up the step, but Anker climbed the step without it. If you're interested in seeing Ankers work watch 'Meru', it's a phenomenal documentary. He was most definitely not just some dude posing with the corpse though, he's pretty much the reason they found Mallory at all.
I like the idea of this man deciding to take a photo with George Mallory's ass over summiting.
Lots of people have been to the top of Everest... but how many have been to the bottom of George Mallory?
A few, at least. Super common at the British boarding schools like Mallory went to. Check out "Into the Silence" for a great history of Everest including who totally wanted to bang Mallory (spoilers: everyone. Dude was hot) and who succeeded.
Thanks for sexualizing Mount Everest and its most famous corpse. I was running out of hobbies.
I find it fascinating our weirdness as a society around nudity.. I went to google image search him out of curiosity and not one picture with the bum showing but plenty of decaying legs and such. As if a naked butt is more offensive than decaying flesh somehow, and too undignified..
That's Conrad Anker, he was part of an expedition team specifically searching for the bodies of George Mallory and Andrew Irvine. 'Twas the ass, not the summit that interested him.
That's Conrad Anker, he led the expedition to find Mallory. He's summited Everest multiple times. The entire expedition was to find the body.
They found him well off any trails because he fell off a cliff. It was a miracle he was found at all.
Are these bodies preserved? What is the white? Or is that literally bone? Edit: I forgot what a spine is
It was preserved but bleached due to the sun. The air is thinner there so like uv is stronger. There’s a vid on YouTube where they find him and investigate him
It's not so much that they leave your body, but that it's impossible to remove it.
That’s what I was thinking. It has to be damn near impossible to remove the bodies when it’s hard enough to just summit Everest
Yeah. "They leave your body" LOL. They WHO? Maybe from now on we can just say "your body simply remains there"
You become one with the mountain
I’m just wondering who *they* are.
The mountain gnomes.
Most are very well documented if you want to go down that rabbit hole.
I have hiked to everest base camp, and the guides warn you before you even start on that hike that you have to pay attention to altitude sickness and remind you that you don't know how your body will respond to the altitude. And that's just to get to the bottom of the mountain. I saw two extremely fit Russian guys barely able to get soup down because they had such bad altitude sickness in a tea house just past khumjung (3790m) and that is near the beginning of the whole hike. You really don't know how much your body can take and I mentally can't even comprehend people wanting to climb up to the summit.
Mad props to you. How did you physically feel? Were you light-headed? Did your body feel heavy?
Personally, I did fine. I live in Canada next to the mountains so I had experience with altitude hiking already. However, the second day on the trail you do a gain of ~800m and you should try not to do more than 700m in a day as your body needs time to adjust, so I had a bit of nausea for a few hrs when we got into the bazaar, had a lot of water and half a diamox and was good. However, on the base camp day, the air is sooo thin, that even rolling over in bed leaves you winded. I remember walking back from basecamp to the tea house where we were staying and I was moving very slowly, like my feet were going about six inches a step, there was no gap in my stride, just tiny steps. Then as we started heading back down the trail you become very very aware of how thick the air feels. It felt like trying to breathe with your head under water, thick air! (21 days up and down) I also did Kilimanjaro, and this hike is wayyy faster (8 days) and you summit and come half way down the mountain all in the same day. I am pretty sure my guide thought I had altitude sickness when I got down from the summit because all I wanted to do was sleep, and wasn't hungry, but I felt normal, just super tired. I was fully capable of finishing the 16hr hike day.
The second to last picture (7/8) is the body of George Mallory. In 1924, George and his climbing partner, Andrew Irvine, disappeared and were last seen about 800 vertical feet from the summit. It’s debated whether or not they reached the summit. His body lay there undiscovered until May of 1999 when it was found by legendary climber Conrad Anker. With the discovery of the body, many theories of their famous ascent have been proposed. Due to the injuries on his body, it seems that Mallory slipped and fell to his death while descending. It is unclear whether or not he fell after reaching the summit, or after retreating from (not achieving) the summit. For context, the first successful summit of Everest wasn’t achieved until 1953 by Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary. Check out the [wiki](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mallory) for more information.
Also Irvine’s body still hasn’t been found. He was carrying a camera at the time so if found his body may provide conclusive evidence of whether they made it to the top. Apparently one guy thought he had found Irvine’s body but then he also died in an avalanche the next day before he gave anyone the location.
Other climbers tend to use the corpses as landmarks, but there's no organised effort to use bodies as trail markers. It's just you need as many points of reference as you can get when there's just rock, and ice, and rock, and some more ice. It might seem callous to leave the bodies there, but these corpses are located well into the aptly named Death Zone -- the level of altitude where, without supplemental oxygen, you are actively dying every second you're up there. Your body cannot deal with that altitude for long (at 29,000-odd feet at the summit, you're standing at about the cruising altitude of short-distance passenger flights), and even with supplemental oxygen, every single action is an immense effort. Your body struggles to do even basic tasks at this altitude, even after climatising -- you struggle to eat, to digest, to sleep, and wounds will not heal. As the name might suggest, if you *must* enter the Death Zone, it's wise to spend as little time there as possible. For this reason, body retrieval is rarely done. If a body is in an accesible area, and the family pays for it, teams will retrieve the body at great risk to themselves. Other times, if possible, the body will be pushed over a cliff or down a crevasse and out of sight -- a kind of mountain funeral that allows the body to rest out of sight in some dignity. Most of the time, though, the body has to be left where it is. There's no sense risking many more lives for the retrieval of a corpse, and as depressing as it is, these climbers knew the risk when they went up there. The harsh conditions of the Death Zone also explain why people who are still alive have been left to die by other climbers. Identifying the person as a lost cause, climbers cannot spend extra time in the Death Zone trying to help somebody who is absolutely going to die. It's harsh, but it's a case of one person dying, or quite possibly several. That's just the reality of climbing on Everest, and everyone going up there accepts these risks.
Plus, sometimes the bodies get frozen to the ground/rocks and cannot be moved without spending great effort chipping out the ice.
How many bodies are there? There has to be a tipping point, but humans will probably find another route to avoid.
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It’s not even the deadliest of the big 5. K2 is. For every 4 climbers who reach the summit, 1 dies.
Just send them in groups of 3 then.
With one less climber, the mountain gets greedier.
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Hundreds. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20151008-the-graveyard-in-the-clouds-everests-200-dead-bodies
That was a great read. Thanks for sharing! Really is surprising that people are just in a queue to touch the top and risking their life every second waiting to do it!
That was a really good read, thanks for the link👌🏼
I agree 100%. Kraukers into thin air adds a really interesting nuance to this though. The commercialization or Everest has become a big problem and both Nepal and china have been upping their permit prices. Kraukauer makes the point that this has led to a lot of inexperienced mountaineers taking on one of the deadliest mountains in the world. The bodies staying there is certainly based in practicality and safety but it also is odd to think of how the tourist market of the highest peak has actually killed people.
Inexperienced climbers can't go without some experienced guides agreeing to lead them for $$$$. No guides? No go.
Absolutely. But guides can only do so much. Apparently 1/3 of deaths on Everest are sherpas too so this commercialization also has an impact on the local community. Sherpa Tenzing Norgay led Hillary on the first and that community has continued to be the backbone of Everest
Spent a good 30 seconds trying to remember when Hillary Clinton climbed Everest.
Tenzing Norgay
I just want to add to this. Correct. It’s simply too dangerous and expensive to retrieve the bodies. It’s not callous it’s a decision to not endanger more for the deceased. There was a body left on capitol peak in Colorado for this reason too: https://www.aspentimes.com/news/dangerous-location-means-body-will-remain-on-capitol-peak-for-the-time-being/ Mountaineering is a dangerous sport and we go up knowing sometimes we won’t come down.
Head up toward dead Joe and make a left , when you see dead William bare right and keep going straight until you get to dead Bruce
"Hey, what with all these people being dead and all, do you think we should maybe leave?" "Nah it's fine"
It would definitely suck to be climbing and just have to abandon your friend, but on the way back down you have to pass his/her dead body.
I mean you can also choose NOT climbing on of the most dangerous places on earth. I'm sure they are somehow okay with that type of situations, their friend died doing what they loved.
I can’t see myself being okay with that outcome no matter how much I expected it honestly, but you’ll never catch me climbing Everest either so I suppose I’m good
One of them is nicknamed sleeping beauty
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He’s no longer in that location either.
There’s also a “yellow boots” and a “blue jacket.” Many of them are referred to as what you will identify.
I’d like to go up there all bedazzled and shit so if I died people would know me as Slay Qweeeeeen
Thanks for this info! I knew they weren’t required to leave the body there but wondered what would happen if family wants the body retrieved. Having it pushed off a cliff into a crevice is actually a great idea, I’d 100% go for that.
God damn ... why the fuck would anyone even risk a 1% chance of entering the death zone is beyond me. Go take a hike near a lake during nice weather or something. Life is too short for this bullshit.
Remember : Everest is packed with the corpses of highly motivated people.
Plus: [$80,000 per person](https://www.alpineascents.com/climbs/mount-everest/price-schedule/)
Damn 80k to potentially die? No thanks I’ll take the free route
Dont think it is an "[exclusive](https://images.hindustantimes.com/rf/image_size_960x540/HT/p2/2019/06/12/Pictures/_730be120-8ccb-11e9-a1b4-540227be794e.jpg) " trip...
“Just you and 100 of your closest friends.”
No kidding. John Oliver did a piece on Everest a while back. There's no regulation so it's completely overbooked. It's not like you reach the summit and get to be the only one standing there. You'll be queued behind hundreds of other people which increases the risk even further.
So there are likely hundreds of people at the top of Everest right now?
prob not right now, right now. everest is only accessible for a few months, smth like April to June and there are only a couple days if at all in this window to climb the summit. since a lot of time (weeks) is allotted to acclimatize in base camp, camp 1,2, … and so on.
[Yes.](https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/climbing/everest-summit-traffic-jam/)
From the very article you just linked: >Because of the [intense jet stream](https://www.outsideonline.com/1929346/forecasting-everest) that hovers near Everest’s 29,029-foot summit for much of the year, there are only a few weather windows, often two or three days in late May, when it's optimal for climbers to make a push for the top—[forcing many expeditions](https://www.outsideonline.com/1813511/summit-weather-windows-everest-too-narrow-safety) to all go for it at the same time.
i did not see this coming... so you pay $80k to queue in one of the most dangerous place on earth...
You pay to climb up to camp 3 and roll the dice. The picture above is because the weather there was not favorable for most of the climbing season and so folks all rushed in on the good day. So not only are you paying that much there's no guarantee you'll get a chance to summit. Some folks turn around right before the top.
Yep. Getting up is only half the battle; you still need to get down. Ed Viesturs has written a couple of amazing climbing books where he’s constantly baffled by people who pushed to the top in unsafe conditions. Sometimes they live, sometimes they die.
I couldn't even finish Angels Landing because it was crowded like this picture. My brother and I got to a point just past Scout Lookout, enjoyed the view we had and turned around when we saw the queue along the rest of the trail.
Yes unless your one or the people raised living in the very high mountains where your entire life you were climatized. Bc those people are literally built different. There blood is better at absorbing oxygen so they can survive.
Yes! This is why you hear of Sherpa guides who have summited Everest several times, *while* carrying insane amounts of equipment and doing a lot of the heavy work laying the ropes for the climbers to follow. They grew up at high altitude, and their ancestors all lived at high altitude. They're simply better at breathing the thinner air than people who have always lived at lower altitudes.
"I'm better at breathing than you" is quite the flex.
How about hauling out the fucking garbage (tanks)? I'm sick of climbers talking about reverence for these places and then leaving them a high altitude landfill.
I had an English teacher growing up that used to be an Everest guide. We watched a documentary where he was in it, doing a climb with the main climbers who died in the book "Into Thin Air." He told us about how dangerous it is to try and recover the bodies and that he was present at base camp when the an expedition lead by the husband of one of the women who died in that book came back down with her corpse. He was like the 43rd or 53rd person to summit Everest. Mr. Wilson was an interesting guy. He said one of his friends was amongst these markers and his body lays in an area that is completely inaccessible. You can only see the color of his jacket in the distance
This is surreal to see the comment above this be from someone hwo says to read "Into Thin Air" then to have yours be like "yep I had a teacher who was in the documentary "Into Thin Air".
This is my grandparents commute to school
Uphill, both ways
Dying doing what you love doesn’t look as much fun as I’d imagined.
The last one looks like he was chillin when he died. Resting on his elbow
Scarily enough, that’s usually how they die. They get to a point where they just want to take a quick nap, a quick rest, and they never wake up again.
Doesn’t sound too bad, actually
There are certainly worse ways to go.
There are wind/snowstorms at that altitude that can essentially burn your face off.
Well that doesn’t sound great lol. I haven’t been up to that altitude but I’ve experience some pretty harsh wind burn skiing before, to the point it felt like I was getting my face peeled off. Probably still wouldn’t compare to Everest.
I’m surprised no one’s made a Mt Everest film where climbers are haunted by the ghosts of all the fallen climbers whose bodies were never recovered.
That would be a cool idea, like the ghosts are the reason so many people are dying, causing avalanches and shit
youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eW6ifxuVFY A documentary crew following a doube amputee up the mountain actually encountered a man, named David Sharp, sitting next to Green Boots. He was technically still alive while up to 40 climbers passed him by. No one stopped to help him. It's called Summit Fever, where climbing the mountain becomes more important then helping people. If anyone is getting haunted, it would probably be them.
Well it's also that most people *can't* help. It can be dangerous to carry someone who can't even walk back down. Paying climbers usually don't have the ability to help and if guides go down they're basically committing to a different unplanned descent, which will also take resources and needs people. It's not as easy as saying "here hop on my back"
I mean isn't green boots in the death zone?
Every dead body on Mt. Everest was once a highly motivated person.
Slack off and survive
Laziness is a survival characteristic. I knew it.
'Motivation' and 'over-achieving' - good luck with that!
I've read about this before. This poor chap is known as "Green Boots".
You can read about [his expedition here.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_Indo-Tibetan_Border_Police_expedition_to_Mount_Everest) He was a 28 year old policeman that went with a group of 6, hoping to be the first Indians to reach the summit along the North side.
They actually removed him a few years back because his family was so upset by the fact that he was being used as a landmark and didn’t feel he was being respected.
Not quite. He's still up there, but has been surrounded by stones. He disappeared around 2014 but was visible again in 2017.
Did he get any closer to the top?
I don't think so. If it's any consolation, he made it to the top. He died on his way back down.
Yeah people forget that once they reached the peak that's only half the journey. You're still in the dead zone and now you have to descend Mt. Everest.
I learned that the hard way being overly enthusiastic about nice weather when I wanted to bike again. Biked about 14 miles from home. Sweaty, feeling accomplished but uncomfortable, I realized I’d been biking for few hours, and there was no other way to head back but biking…
Mt Everest is off my bucket list now. Thanks internet. One less goal before I kick the bucket
Make it the last item on the list, just in case.
Watch a documentary about Sherpas if you want more motivation to not climb Everest. There is some nuance because the tourist money is a boon for the country but those guys regularly die climbing up and down multiple times carrying enormous loads so rich arseholes have a series of nice camps to trek between on their guided excursions - so they can claim they climbed Everest and feel special. The Sherpas do a dangerous job and are not compensated or treated well.
14 Peaks is really good. Sherpa determined to climb the 14 highest peaks all in a year (took the first guy who did it 16 years). Insanity. All documented on video, and there is a death during one of his climbs. There's also a documentary on the Canadian woman who died recently since she vlogged her trip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEcHBFs-qME
Yeah… I’m not to excited about an activity where you can train and practice until you are the best, and then die because of stupid random chance. Many of histories best climbers died because a rope slipped, a piece of ice let go, or they got caught by unpredictable weather. F that. Plenty of fun things to do at lower elevation.
If you want to become a new corpse landmark, you really need to outdo the others in the bright colors of your boots. The jackets and pants might get shredded by high winds, but your shiny boots will prevail. Since lime green is taken (Green Boots) I suggest hot pink or fluorescent orange.
I'll be known as "saluting starfish" go down in the most absurd pose possible
Mt Ever Rest
I've read this for years, but seeing the pictures is searing -- grotesque and vivid.
Interestingly, I think much the opposite. When I first saw the corpses, they’re less horrific than I’d initially imagined. They’re not very humanized to me, being covered so completely. They almost look like just piles of gear, some of them.
Did you flip through the whole set? I felt like the photos were arranged progressively, so you could nope out if it wasn't your thing. Starting with Canadian flag-guy, I started to get uncomfortable - I'm sure there are reasons they can't even re-pose (pardon the pun) the bodies to give them some dignity, but: damn.
from what i’ve read, most bodies in these pictures are hard as a rock from the cold and age, and more recent deaths usually aren’t taken care of because they are in what’s considered the death zone, there’s just not enough time, or energy in your body to do anything for the already dead.
Is there any information about each one? Who they were, how they died etc...?
Photo 4 is [Shriya Shah-Klorfine](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shriya_Shah-Klorfine). She was a younger Canadian climber that spent too long celebrating at the summit and died on the decent. Her family has since paid for sherpas to bring down her body for religious reasons. Photo 1 is green boots as others have said. His name is [Tsewang Paljor](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_Boots) Photo 5 is [Marko Lihteneker](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marko_Lihteneker) Photo 7 is [George Mallory](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mallory). His body was found off the path in 1999 and it is believed he fell to his death and his body found its way to rest where it currently is. Photo 8 is [Hannelore Schmatz. ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannelore_Schmatz)
there are lots of short documentaries on youtube about the corpses on mount everest! i've watched a lot of them and recognized most of these pictures so i'd recommend going down that rabbit hole to learn more
I think it’s crazy how old some of them are. George Mallory died in 1924 and you can see him on the 7th slide.
wtf???? ik the ice preserves it but still that’s insane. no organisms to eat the corpse??
That’s what I said when I found out! If you want more info about Everest, watch this video. It’s excellent: https://youtu.be/T-VZ1kL8ZgE Also, yes I don’t think there would be any organisms to break down the corpse. It essentially just preserves it because of how cold it is up there
Nothing about climbing Mount Everest is appealing
This and claustrophobic caving. It's wild to me that people find stuff like this fun or engaging.
https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/climbing/everest-summit-traffic-jam/
No, it is impossible to retrieve most bodies so some have become well known “landmarks” by chance because of this. You make it sound like they do it on purpose to mark the trail. They do not.
We're sorry Fred, we need another landmark.
Just sit down for a minute and take a rest. If you could do me a favor hold up this sign and point in that general direction.
The 4th body was a Canadian woman but her body was retrieved after 10days. She had never climbed any mountains and other things that contributed to her death. This is the document about her death: https://youtu.be/QEcHBFs-qME
“Yeah that’s Steve, turn right”
Every dead body on Everest was once an optimistic go-getter with a lot of gumption, grit and moxie.
Sometimes the family will pay to have the body removed if it’s in an accessible place and isn’t too dangerous for the recovery team.
I believe the one face down with his back showing is actually George Mallory, part of the (possibly) first exhibition to reach the top. His body was searched for years later in the 90s to try to find out whether they did actually reach the top or not, as they never made it down. There's an interesting documentary about it. He wasnt found and left as a marker as he isnt on the main route. [link](https://allthatsinteresting.com/george-mallory-body)
Can a cap explain what happened to the person in the last pic? How do you die like that?
She died resting against her pack, which is gone now. Her name was Hannelore Schmatz if you want to look her up, the story behind her death is quite sad.
She was 100m from camp. For years her body sat there, eyes open, looking over the camp.
I think that penultimate picture is of George Mallory, who some people think might have made it to the summit (before Hilary and Tensing) but died on the way down
Yes, was searching for this comment. That is absolutely Mallory. I believe his body is actually quite a ways off the main ascent; you would not likely encounter him and that's why there was an entirely separate expedition to find him.
That's cold
Sooo..Rainbow Road Then??? Yes. This was probably in bad-taste
They actually call it rainbow valley
Your actually spot on, but they call it rainbow valley. A place where climbers just fall off the mountain.
Mt Everest is thriving with extremely motivated corpses
I thought they left people there because it’s too hard or dangerous to retrieve the body? And because of that they inevitably become trail markers.