{"id":62267,"date":"2019-06-25T17:37:33","date_gmt":"2019-06-26T00:37:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/?p=62267"},"modified":"2020-05-22T12:51:17","modified_gmt":"2020-05-22T19:51:17","slug":"what-happened-on-everest-this-year-the-big-picture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/climb\/what-happened-on-everest-this-year-the-big-picture","title":{"rendered":"What Happened On Everest This Year: The Big Picture"},"content":{"rendered":"

When reflecting on this year\u2019s Everest season, Himalayan expert Alan Arnette described it as \u201cthe best of times and the worst of times.\u201d During the peak\u2019s two-month climbing window\u2014April and May annually\u2014an estimated 900 people<\/a> stood on the summit of the world\u2019s tallest mountain, an all-time high. Eleven people also died\u2014making it one of the deadliest Everest climbing seasons on record<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I was one of those who summited. On May 22, I climbed from Camp 4 at the South Col to the top of the world with International Mountain Guides<\/a>. I\u2019ve guided around the world for IMG for a decade, but this time I wasn\u2019t working\u2060\u2014<\/span><\/span>just climbing. I descended safely down the Lhotse Face and through the Khumbu Icefall, then caught a helicopter to Kathmandu and a flight home to Seattle. I\u2019ve been home for a few weeks, but I\u2019m barely beginning to process the experience.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Through my jet-lagged haze, I saw the media coverage of the season and the conversations it sparked. During the last weeks of May and beginning of June, The New York Times<\/em> published headlines like These Are The Victims of a Deadly Climbing Season on Mount Everest<\/em><\/a> and Nepal Seeks Help Identifying Bodies on Mount Everest<\/em><\/a>. <\/em>A friend sent me a link to a piece in The Atlantic <\/em>titled Everest is Over<\/em><\/a>. <\/em>An Instagram image<\/a> of a line of people on the summit ridge went viral. My climbing teammates, some of whom had been home for less than 48 hours, were called, emailed and sent personal messages online by producers, editors and journalists from around the world who opened with questions like, \u201cWhat\u2019s it like to step over a dead body?\u201d and \u201cCould you see their faces? Were they in pain?\u201d My teammate told me he just shook his head. \u201cI just hung up the phone,\u201d he said. \u201cThis was a multi-dimensional experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Arnette said a variety of factors created a perfect storm this season. \u201cThere were too few windows of good weather, too many guide services who were willing to take anybody regardless of experience, and too many people who didn\u2019t know that they needed that much experience to climb the tallest mountain in the world. Individually those factors could be dealt with, but together they broke the model that\u2019s been working on this mountain.\u201d<\/p>\n

To help understand how those factors contributed to one of the deadliest years on record, it\u2019s easiest to look at them separately.<\/p>\n

A short weather window<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Mid- to late May is historically the ideal time to summit Everest because the jet stream that sits over the mountain\u2014which can blast winds up to 100 miles per hour at the peak<\/a>\u2014subsides for short periods of time, making it possible to climb the upper mountain. Teams use a variety of forecasting methods, including mountain weather websites, specifically hired meteorologists and real-time data from support staff stationed up and down the mountain.<\/p>\n

Last season, in 2018, the weather window lasted from May 13 until 24, giving teams 12 days to spread out their summit attempts. This year, the jet stream was more unpredictable, making it difficult to anticipate when the good weather would come. Teams were incentivized to take advantage of the two small windows that did occur, May 14-16 and May 22-24. Most climbers<\/a> made summit bids on May 22 and 23, which contributed to crowding on the summit ridge, longer wait times, and\u2014some say\u2014the deaths of several of the climbers.<\/p>\n

In 2018, five people died, but Arnette says those deaths did not happen the way several did this year, during the descent shortly after reaching the peak. It\u2019s difficult to know precisely what causes deaths that happen on the descent because there are usually no autopsies. Reports often say \u201cexhaustion on descent\u201d or \u201caltitude sickness.\u201d This may refer to high-altitude pulmonary or cerebral edema or to any number of other factors that can end human life after too much time in the \u201cdeath zone,” or above 8,000 meters: heart attack, stroke or simply the loss of consciousness that leads hypoxic climbers to collapse or fall asleep and never wake up.<\/p>\n

Guides and guide companies who don\u2019t require experience<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The knowledge and fitness clients are expected to have before attempting Everest varies from company to company. Some guides require years of mountaineering experience and high altitude training, but ethics aside, there\u2019s no reason guiding companies can\u2019t accept every potential client who has the money. For reference, a typical Everest expedition costs between $30,000 and $100,000 USD.<\/p>\n

The reputable companies carefully vet and work with clients for years before agreeing to take them into the death zone, and they self-report accidents and deaths, Arnette says. \u201cThe less reputable companies are taking anybody they can get.”<\/p>\n

Despite suggestions from some in the international climbing community, no governing body\u2014government, guide service, nonprofit or otherwise\u2014currently enforces any requirements for mountaineering experience, physical fitness or health. Although the actual qualifying requirements suggested vary, a common idea is to ensure aspiring Everest summiters to have previously climbed at least one 8,000-meter\u00a0peak.<\/p>\n

Crowds of climbers<\/strong><\/h4>\n

This was, by all accounts, the most crowded season Everest has ever seen. The Himalayan Database<\/a> keeps official records of Everest climbers, but it can take months to verify those numbers. So until the database releases its official figures later this year, Arnette\u2019s blog<\/a> is considered the most accurate source for statistics. An estimated 659 climbers from the Nepal side of the mountain and 241 from the Chinese side successfully summited, and that doesn\u2019t account for the support staff, porters and climbers who didn\u2019t reach the top.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s currently no limit on the number of climbers on Mount Everest in a given season. Summiting from the Nepal side is typically more popular, and non-Nepali climbers pay $11,000 for a permit. Nepali climbers and staff pay either dramatically reduced rates or nothing at all, depending on their role. The situation in China is less transparent, and it\u2019s unclear if there\u2019s a limit on the number of permits issued each year. There are discussions about potentially changing the permitting process<\/a>, The\u00a0New York Times <\/em>reports.<\/p>\n

Beyond the headlines <\/strong><\/h4>\n

While the deaths are horrific, the conversation has, at times, been a single snapshot of a complex, two-month adventure.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to hear more about how this beautiful, inspiring mountain brings people together from all over the world,” says professional ski mountaineer Caroline Gleich, who summited from the North side with Alpenglow Expeditions<\/a> this year. “I want to see more about how incredibly positive this community and these experiences can be. I want to hear more about the teams of international climbers who are overcoming their differences and working together for a common goal. And I\u2019m especially heartbroken that we\u2019re not hearing more coverage of the two amazing Sherpa widows who climbed this year.<\/a> They lost their husbands [while working on Everest] in 2013 and 2014, and they summited together this season to finish what their partners had started. But people want to see the trash. They\u2019re curious about the destruction. They want to see the negatives. I understand that people are curious about death, but it\u2019s turning into disaster porn.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think of it as a mountain of dreams,\u201d Arnette said. \u201cWe\u2019ll remember and learn from the ones who died, but let\u2019s not forget that more people than ever before had one of the best days of their entire lives.\u201d<\/p>\n

When people ask me what I remember, I think of that giant purple sunrise. I remember the hard work, the seemingly infinite hours of training, the never-ending walk up the world\u2019s biggest hill. I remember hugging our team\u2019s Sherpa on the summit, and I remember the moment I realized that he was crying, too. I remember seeing the bodies of the climbers who\u2019d passed, the way I felt when I stepped over them, and the way this adventure brought people together in that joy and in that pain. And I remember the way my friends and family supported me<\/a> on this dream.<\/p>\n

\"The

The author and the Sherpa guide on the top of Mount Everest.<\/p><\/div>\n<\/span>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When reflecting on this year\u2019s Everest season, Himalayan expert Alan Arnette described it as \u201cthe best of times and the worst of times.\u201d During the peak\u2019s two-month climbing window\u2014April and May annually\u2014an estimated 900 people stood on the summit of the world\u2019s tallest mountain, an all-time high. Eleven people also died\u2014making it one of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":62275,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[352,1657,1738,727],"internal-tag":[],"class_list":["post-62267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-climb","tag-climb","tag-everest","tag-himalaya","tag-latest-posts"],"parsely":{"version":"1.1.0","canonical_url":"https:\/\/rei.com\/blog\/climb\/what-happened-on-everest-this-year-the-big-picture","smart_links":{"inbound":0,"outbound":0},"traffic_boost_suggestions_count":0,"meta":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","headline":"What Happened On Everest This Year: The Big Picture","url":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/climb\/what-happened-on-everest-this-year-the-big-picture","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"http:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/climb\/what-happened-on-everest-this-year-the-big-picture"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/06\/GettyImages-Everest.jpg?resize=150%2C150","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https:\/\/www.rei.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2019\/06\/GettyImages-Everest.jpg?fit=2000%2C1000"},"articleSection":"Climb","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Michelle Flandreau"}],"creator":["Michelle Flandreau"],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Uncommon Path \u2013 An REI Co-op Publication","logo":""},"keywords":["climb","everest","himalaya","latest posts"],"dateCreated":"2019-06-26T00:37:33Z","datePublished":"2019-06-26T00:37:33Z","dateModified":"2020-05-22T19:51:17Z"},"rendered":"