AIBU to be blown away by this? TW - Deaths on Everest.

[Chefpig]

I have read a news article about the person who died on Everest 30 years ago, known as Green Boots and wondered if his body would have been preserved by the snow and icy conditions up there. After some reading, I believe his body would not have decomposed and so his face will be the same, still in his late 40's. Forever young.

I read the ascent of rum doodle over the holiday and it’s an amusing skewering of the climbing community written some time ago

He looks like a small human shaped pretzel.

Sherpa (capital S) is a family name. Without the capital, it has become a generic term for a guide or porter who is not part of the Sherpa family group. A Sherpa is born into the Sherpa family of which there are about 250,000 today. A Sherpa can choose to be a mountain guide or something else, but the former pays significantly better. Prospects do exist in mountain climbing outside Nepal, and some work overseas, but it is a source of family pride to remain in the Himalayas.

I thought it was quite funny too.

I sort of think this. I'm not furious with them, by any means - you do you, but my sympathy tends to lie more with Sherpas. I think if you opt to do something so needlessly dangerous, and it's a known fact that climbing Everest is dangerous, then you have to accept that people's sympathy will be limited. That's not to say I hope people die, of course. I felt the same about visiting the Titanic. I felt very sad for the young boy but it just seemed so unnecessary.

It's called dark humour. Not to everyone's taste but it's certainly my preferred way of dealing with otherwise distressing subjects (and this made me laugh!)

The summit of K2 isn't as high as Everest but it's a steeper more technically difficult climb so fewer climbers attempt it. It has a higher death to summit ration than Everest but fewer bodies. Severe weather and avalanches move bodies out of sight of common climbing routes so dead climbers aren't seen as often. It's not called the savage mountain for nothing.

It was very sad watching Nadhira AL Harthys body being offloaded from the plane sent to bring her home after dying on Broad Peaks this month. I still can’t quite take in what happened to her and the other souls with her.

Thanks for this tip, I’ve just ordered it. I absolutely loved her book Dark Matter.

I don’t think you have the right image. Reality is far less kind. He will have been mummified by the cold, dry air and his tissues would be dessicated over time. He will not look the same at all. Probably more like something from Gray’s Anatomy (the book, not the tv show.) My godfather died on Everest after submitting. I became obsessed with what happens to their bodies. He’s been up there since 1996.

The problem with endorsements like that for brands is that the bastards have usually changed how they make them in the last 20 years and they’re never as good.

Everest is littered with bodies as well as all sorts of rubbish. Green boots is sadly just one of them. Have you heard of sleeping beauty?

I wish people would stop climbing it tbh. I also wish they'd stop trying to dive down into the depths of the ocean too. Some places are just not meant for us and we need to accept that.

Sorry @Kimmers4334

I don't like the sound of your Therapist date..

That would drive me mad if someone kept finding my random actions professionally "interesting" . Did it get better or did you dump?

apologies for going off track from the thread.

People should leave space alone too!!

just selfish twats the lot of them

Another Michelle Paver fan here, loved Wakenhyrst and Dark Matter, off to order some more of her books.

I’m just listening to Into Thin Air right now and it’s absolutely fascinating. It’s free on Audible I believe.

Everest is the world's highest altitude graveyard. 200 or so I believe. Not to mention literal metric tonnes of rubbish and human excrement.

It’s also called the “world’s highest garbage dump”

I have to say I was zero sympathy for anyone who dies doing this. Or who suffers serious injury. Its just about the stupidest riskiest thing a human can do that serves nothing but the ego.

Why does anyone want to visit a place that's littered with dead bodies?

Jon Krakauer's book was very telling although I felt he would have had a lot more to say on the subject of guided expeditions but for the amount of hostility and judgment he attracted from climbers' relatives, the media and other 'Everesters'.
I'm not a spiritual person but I find it incredibly disrespectful that the bodies of climbers are just left there along with all the human waste and discarded equipment.

Indeed.

Like cemeteries or graveyards ?

He has been moved some years ago I believe by friends of his, climber associates/friends going up to give a decent burial even years later is common I think, not sure if they took the body down the mountain or just moved him off the main path where he had become a landmark and used as a direction finder to the summit. There is a very disturbing documentary (most Everest docs.are disturbing in some way) about an English climber who was huddled up somewhere near the main route that Green Boots used to be on and left to die because the many dozens of climbers who passed him that day though he was the famous Green Boots because he was wearing green climbing boots.