Day Five

The problem on Mt. Everest is the death of climbers in the area on the mountain known as the death zone.

Some evidence of this is the amount of people that die in this area. 175 people have died on the mountain and there is said to be at least 41 bodies on the north side of the mountain. Because of the dangers the climbers do not camp a night in the death zone, they only stay in camp four for a few hours. One example of this problem would be the case of Rob Halls final expedition in which he was killed in a blizzard only a little ways from the summat in the death zone. In the video we saw in class last trimester one of the serpias describes a event in which he found a dieing climber who was suffering from pulmonary edema (a sickness in which fluid fills the lungs) and managed to save him. This is just one of many stories which shows the deadlyness of the altitude in the death zone.

Some contributing factors to the death in the death zone is the cold, high winds, lack of oxygen and the high altitude. The death is also caused by the fatigue the the climbers gain by climbing to the summat and not getting much sleep at camp four before they summat. As more and more time is spent in the death zone the climbers bodies deteriorate and the climbers suffer from more and more fatigue. The climbers also run a very high risk of running out of oxygen and then dieing from the lack of oxygen in the death zone.

The only solution to this problem is to train the climbers better and have very strict rules for the people that can climb the mountain. They should also to regulate the number of passes given out to climb the mountain. one final thing is to just expect that sometimes people will die climbing no matter what you do.