Climbing Mount Everest: A Bad Idea

Imagine yourself climbing Everest, the cold air in your lungs and your adrenaline rushing, because of the risk they’re taking. That feeling is what mountaineers crave. On April 18, 2014, an avalanche caused one of the greatest loss of life in the history of the fabled peek. Now the tragedy has sparked a debate on whether climbing Mt. Everest should continue to be permitted. In my opinion, regardless of the risk, I think people should still be able to climb Mt. Everest.

One very off-putting factor for climbing Mount Everest is the climb itself. This is because of all of the risks taken when doing so. All of the risks are very extreme and most can actually lead to death as many that have attempted making the treacherous journey up the mountain have not made it back down safely. This factor can become stuck in many people’s heads and change their minds about making the journey up this beautiful mountain completely. Although several see the travel up the mountain as dangerous and unpleasant, many also see it as the best part of the whole trip. This makes perfect sense seeing as during this climb you can experience some of the most beautiful scenery anyone would ever have the chance to see in their entire lives. The climb has been said to be beautiful and well worth all of the hardship of injury and pain. Overall the climb up the mountain can be seen as the whole reason not to climb Mount Everest or the very reason to do so, but either way the sights you can see are magnificent, or are they?

As said by Zopa, “You can never tell who the mountain will allow, and who it will not.” Peak needs to reach the top of the mountain as soon as possible, before he turns 15, in order to break the world record of having the youngest person reach above 29,000 feet. To do this, though, he endangers his life with the cold, getting oxygen, and just the climb itself. As they say, “Climb high, sleep low,” to get acclimatized, that way your lungs will be caught up with your body, or else they would collapse and you could come down with a serious case of HAPE. With the climb itself, Peak faces quite a few difficulties. At one point, when he was climbing up a steep slope with his axes, one of Sun-Jo’s slipped, and he was dangling. But, being the hero he is, Peak climbed sideways towards the rope that was hanging there, grabbed it, and swung down to Sun-Jo, saving him just as his crampon was slipping. There were other things like avalanches that happened, but the most killer thing was the so called death zone. In it, you have to get in and out in under 18 hours, or else you will meet certain death. Oxygen or not, there’s only a certain time limit you can survive it. Of course Peak made it out in time, but he did not, in fact, reach the summit, which was actually rather

The entire journey up the mountain is full of danger. You constantly have to worry about the oxygen you are getting and people around you are dying. The air is thin and if there is any air, it’s contaminated. You have to worry about getting the disease H.A.P.E. You have to worry about your health 24/7. You have to get past impossible obstacles. You just have to be strong. Climbing the mountain is an endless, painful battle. No matter what is happening outside of the mountain, on Mount Everest all that matters is Survival.

In order to continue climbing Everest, many aspects of climbing need to be improved before more people endanger their lives to try and reach the roof of the world. The guides have some areas that need the most reform. During the ascension of Everest the guides made a plethora mistakes that seemed insignificant but only aided in disaster. The guides first mistake is allowing “any bloody idiot [with enough determination] up” Everest (Krakauer 153). By allowing “any bloody idiot” with no climbing experience to try and climb the most challenging mountain in the world, the guides are almost inviting trouble. Having inexperienced climbers decreases the trust a climbing team has in one another, causing an individual approach to climbing the mountain and more reliance on the guides. While this approach appears fine, this fault is seen in addition to another in Scott Fischer’s expedition Mountain Madness. Due to the carefree manner in which the expedition was run, “clients [moved] up and down the mountain independently during the acclimation period, [Fischer] had to make a number of hurried, unplanned excursions between Base Camp and the upper camps when several clients experienced problems and needed to be escorted down,” (154). Two problems present in the Mountain Madness expedition were seen before the summit push: the allowance of inexperienced climbers and an unplanned climbing regime. A third problem that aided disaster was the difference in opinion in regards to the responsibilities of a guide on Everest. One guide “went down alone many hours ahead of the clients” and went “without supplemental oxygen” (318). These three major issues: allowing anyone up the mountain, not having a plan to climb Everest and differences in opinion. All contributed to the disaster on Everest in

As much as I thought that the first chapter should have been removed, the book, overall, changed the way I viewed Mount Everest. The novel helps to understand that there is much more than just climbing up and down. For instance, when Krakauer talks about expenses and equipment, he says, “That autumn the ministry raised the permit fee again to fifty thousand dollars plus ten thousand dollars for each additional climber.” This shows that there is an extensive amount of planning and equipment to be covered. Krakauer also tells that a storm on Everest can be much more deadly than a storm at sea level. At the end of chapter twenty, he says, “Brice Herrod is now presumed dead, the twelfth casualty of the season.” Its descriptions like these which make me view Everest as both a great challenge, but also a potential deathtrap.

It would be very hard to find someone who does not agree with the opinion that curiosity is in the human nature. People will explore the depths of the oceans and blast off into space to learn and discover. However when people know they have a safety net or a ticket out of danger then they are more inclined to take risks. Mount Everest is one of these situations. Rescue services should not be given to people when they put themselves at risk because rescuing them from their own bad decisions can cost a lot of money, they life of others, and the life of themselves.

Why is Mount Everest so dangerous? The people who want to climb Mount Everest are aware of the risk… But actually, the risk is part of the attraction for some people. Not everyone can manage the treacherous climb. In fact, some people pay with their lives for climbing Mount Everest. Everest is 29,035 feet from its base to its peak. The people who climb Everest are very skilled. People do not have the right to rescue services when they put themselves at risk because, they are making a life threatening risk to themselves and they are also making a risk to the people who are trying to save them.

There are many dangers on Everest such as, avalanches, cravasses, strong winds, steepness, and thin air. Bill Burke is a 69 year old mountain climber. At the age of 67, Bill decided on taking on the ultimate challenge of climbing the great Mount Everest. Although he has climbed other mountains before, such as Mount Rainier and Mount McKinley, Mount Everest would be much more challenging due to its height and dangers. On Bill’s attempt to summit Everest, he would like to find different paths along the mountain.

Approximately there was 282 deaths from 19924 to August 2015. 102 of those deaths were because of the use without using oxygen supply. In 2000 to 2015 there were 5,832 summits and about 112 deaths, which is about 1.9% of the people that paid to climb. We lose americans to that mountian every year. That is why i believe that no everyone should be allowed to climb Mount Everest.

Not only climbing Mount Everest can affect the climber, environment, but it can affect the local population of Nepal. According to the textbook Geography Alive! Regions and People it says on page 422 “ Porters are sometimes overworked and they are mistreated.” It is clearly testified that not everyone is nice to the porters, when they are only trying to help the climber climb safe to the summit. Another evidence, on page 216 from the book Peak, where it says “I had seen a dead person, let alone a frozen dead person.” Peak has testified that he saw a corpse just laying down face down on the cold snow on camp 4. This was new to him because he was not expecting this new thing for him. Concluding with this, climbing Mount Everest is not the best

On May 10, 1996 six people died trying to reach the summit of Mt. Everest. These people were parts of two expeditions that were in the Himalayas, preparing to ascend the summit for six weeks. The first group was under the direction of Rob Hall, who had put 39 paying clients on the summit in five years. Hall was considered the leader of the mountain and the man to see no matter what the discrepancy. Group two, headed by Fisher, who like Hall, was trying to start a profitable business in providing the experience of climbing Mt. Everest to all for the price of 60 to 70 thousand dollars. Unfortunatly, neither man would live to tell the tale of this expedition.

Mount Everest is the biggest mountain in the world, and because of that attracts many climbers to try and climb all 29,029 feet of it, but think about all the trash they leave behind while climbing. In 2013 4,000 people have reached Everest’s summit, with many more attempting to. Mount Everest has a natural beauty, one that should be preserved, and people climbing the mountain and leaving their garbage on it is ruining it. Climbers have a negative impact on Mount Everest, and while journeying to the top, they are slowly destroying the mountain.

Have you ever thought of what it’s like to climb Mount Everest? Well if you think it’s easy, let me tell you that you are very wrong. 1996 was the best climbing year ever. There was about fifty people who attempted. But four very well known ones that summited together are, Rob Hall, Beck Weathers, David Breshears, and Ed Viesturs. They have all summited before, so it’s nothing new. The date they picked to summit was May 10th, it was a lucky date for them in previous climbs. So, to the summit we go!

A reason for that is their have been over 230 deaths on the mountain and still counting. Because not everyone can complete the climb because it can be to hard on their body or they can’t handle the cold winds and the freezing temperatures. Over 230 deaths is a a lot knowing that the climbing season is only two months of the year. The youngest person to complete the climb was a 13 year old. So obviously everyone can do it is just a matter of will you say “I am going to do it”. And the oldest person to climb everest was a 73 year old women. So that is also another great reason why anyone can climb Everest. So those are a few reason why people need to call the rescue team and why the rescue team needs to be their faster, because there are lives on the