1. Although Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world, its summit is not the farthest point from the center of the Earth. The farthest point is on Mount Chimborazo in South America.

 

2. Mount Everest has two heights: a) 8,848 meters (with snow cover). This is the official height recognized by China and Nepal; b) 8,844.43 meters (geological height). This height was measured by China and is also recognized by Nepal as the rock height of Everest.

 

3. In 2008, the Beijing Olympic torch arrived on Mount Everest at 9:17am on May 8th, marking the first time in human history that the Olympic torch had been carried to the world’s highest peak and the highest place to hand on the torch in Olympic history.

 

4. May to October is the peak tourist season on Mount Everest.

 

5. The summit of Everest is on the border of Nepal and Tibet (China). Nepal lies to the south and China to the north.

 

6. The name Everest was originally proposed by Andrew Waugh, the British Surveyor General of India. He chose the name of his predecessor in the post, Sir George Everest.

 

mount everestMount Everest

7. In Nepal, Mount Everest is known as Sagarmatha, meaning ‘Goddess of the Sky’.

 

8. In Tibet, it is known as Chomolungma, meaning ‘Goddess Mother of the World’.

 

9. As of December 2018, there were 9,159 summits of Mount Everest on all routes by 5,294 people.

 

10. There is a “two o’clock rule” when climbing Mount Everest because of its cold and unpredictable weather. That is, be sure to get to the summit by 2pm or you’ll have to turn around in case of accidents.

 

everest base campTents at Everest Base Camp

11. Everest Base Camp has a Wi-Fi service.

 

12. The first summit was on May 29th, 1953 by Sir Edmund Hillary from New Zealand and Tenzing Norgay, a Sherpa from Nepal, climbing from the southern slopes of Nepal.

 

13. Chinese mountaineers – Wang Fuzhou, Gongbu, and Qu Yinhua – climbed to the summit in 1960 for the first time. It was also the first summit from the north slope in Tibet.

 

14. The first American to reach the summit of Mount Everest was Jim Whittaker alongside the Sherpa Nawang Gombu on May 1, 1963.

 

15. The first blind person to reach the summit was the American Erik Weihenmayer in 2001.

 

16. A Nepalese couple got married on the summit of Mount Everest in 2005, being the first people to get married there.

 

17. In 1975, Junko Tabei, a Japanese woman, became the first woman to summit Mount Everest.

 

mount everestMount Everest

18. There is 66% less oxygen in each breath on the summit than at sea level.

 

19. The first climbers to summit Everest without bottled oxygen were the Italian mountaineer Reinhold Messner along with the Austrian mountaineer Peter Habeler in 1978.

 

20. Sherpas are the best guides on Everest. Providing guide services for mountaineering teams from various countries has become one of the main sources of income for Sherpas. They mainly live in Nepal, with a few scattered in China, India, and Bhutan.