Page 18 - IAV Digital Magazine #472

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As Mount Everest Glaciers Melt, Dead Bodies of Climbers Emerge
By Yasemin Saplakoglu
Melting glaciers are revealing dozens of dead bodies on the world’s tallest mountain, according to news reports.
The treacherous journey to the summit of Mount Everest is rid- dled with obsta- cles — falling ice, ragged ter- rain, biting tem- peratures and incredible heights that cause altitude sickness. While nearly 5,000 people have successfully climbed the mountain, another 300 are thought to have died along the way.
Some of these bodies ended up covered in ice and remained hidden that way for many years. But now, climate change is accel-
erating the ice melt around them, exposing multiple limbs and bodies,
the BBC report- ed last month.
Last year, a group of researchers found that the ice on Everest was warmer than average, and a study con- ducted four years ago found that ponds on
the mountain were expanding with melting ice water, according to the BBC. But it’s not only melting glaciers that are expos- ing these bodies — it’s also the movement of the Khumbu Glacier in Nepal.
Most of the bod- ies are turning up at the Khumbu Icefall, one of the most
dangerous spots on the moun- tain.
There, blocks of ice can unex- pectedly col- lapse and gla- ciers can slip several feet downhill per day, The Washington Post reported in 2015. In 2014, 16 climbers were killed at once in that area, crushed
under falling ice.
After searing tragedy, Everest’s dead- liest route is off- limits
Removing bod- ies from the mountain is a delicate, danger- ous and extremely costly task riddled with legal con- straints. Nepal’s law, for exam- ple, requires
government agencies to be involved when dealing with them, according to the BBC.
What’s more, “most climbers like to be left on the mountains if they died” there, Alan Arnette, a mountaineer, told the BBC.
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