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Nepalese Sherpa Kami Rita scales Everest for 31st time, breaks own record
The 55-year-old climber leading stood atop the 8,849-meter summit at around 4 am on Tuesday under stable weather conditions, according to Mingma Sherpa, chairman of Seven Summit Treks, the expedition organiser.
He was guiding a team of the Indian Army Adventure Wing Everest Expedition, led by Lieutenant Colonel Manoj Joshi.
This new feat cements his status as the record holder for the highest number of ascents to the top of the world a record that no one else has come close to, the Kathmandu Post newspaper quoted Mingma as saying.
Kami Rita is safe and stable after his summit. He has started his descent and is on his way back to base camp, he added. As always, Kami has demonstrated his unmatched skills and professionalism on the mountain. We are immensely proud of his achievement and the legacy he continues to build.
In the last two years, Kami Rita scaled Mt Everest twice each season taking his successful summits count to 30.
Kami Rita developed a deep passion for climbing from a young age and has been scaling mountains for over two decades, Chhang Dawa Sherpa, Expedition Director at Seven Summit Treks, said.
His mountaineering journey began in 1992 when he joined an expedition to Everest as a support staff member.
According to Dawa, between 1994 to 2025 Kami Rita also scaled K2 and Mt Lhotse one time, Manaslu thrice, and Cho Oyu eight times.
Hundreds of climbers attempt to climb Mount Everest from the Nepali side each year.
Everest was first climbed in 1953 by New Zealander Edmund Hillary and Nepali Sherpa Tenzing Norgay.
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NDTV
3 hours ago
- NDTV
Drones Clean "World's Highest Garbage Dump" At Mount Everest
Human waste, empty oxygen cylinders, kitchen leftovers and discarded ladders. Sherpas working on Mount Everest carry all that and more - 20 kilograms (44 pounds) per person - navigating a four-hour hike that traverses crumbling glacial ice and treacherous crevasses to bring trash back to base camp. During the most recent climbing season, they had new assistance from two giant SZ DJI Technology Co. drones, which can complete the same journey in six minutes, sharing the task of clearing an expanding volume of refuse piling up on the world's highest peak. Drones have been deployed to haul garbage from Everest's Camp 1, which sits at 6,065 meters (19,898 feet) above sea level down to base camp, about 700 meters below. After a DJI FlyCart 30 delivers supplies like ropes and ladders up the peak, Sherpas hook on a debris-filled garbage bag for the drone's return journey as it buzzes down the mountain, sounding like an oversized mosquito. Between mid-April and mid-May, the drones operated by Nepal-based firm Airlift Technology handled more than 280 kilograms of refuse, according to the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee, a local non-profit that manages trash collection on Everest. The drones are part of a growing effort to clean the slopes of the mountain, which has become so trash-strewn, it's been referred to as the "world's highest garbage dump." Enlisting robots can help not only speed up the process but also reduce the danger for the Sherpas carrying decades-worth of garbage down the treacherous peak. "We're very happy," said Lhakpa Nuru Sherpa, a 33-year-old Sherpa at local expeditions firm Asian Trekking who has reached the summit of Everest 15 times. He estimates that about 70% of the garbage usually carted off the mountain by his team was transported by drone this year. "When you're coming down from Camp 1 and it's warm, you can smell the garbage," and that has caused respiratory problems for some Sherpas, he said. "We want more drones carrying heavier weights." The 8,849-meter Everest has seen an influx of trash since the 1990s, when visiting grew in popularity following multiple successful summit attempts. During climbing season, which typically lasts from late April until the end of May, tens of thousands of people trek to base camp, though only hundreds attempt to reach the top of the peak each year. Everest's garbage problem is worst at higher altitude campsites, which are also more challenging to clean given the logistical hurdles of reaching them. Since 2019, the Nepalese army and Sherpas have worked together to remove more than 100 tons of waste from the mountain and several surrounding peaks. In the last decade, the government has also implemented rules requiring climbers who venture above base camp to carry back at least 8 kilograms of trash each or risk forfeiting a $4,000 deposit that those visiting the mountain must pay. Climate change is only adding to the urgency to clean Everest. Snow and ice are melting, exposing decades-old garbage that can contaminate waterways fed by the runoff and that flow down to villages below. To combat the risks of human waste spreading diseases such as cholera, local officials last year put in place regulations compelling climbers to keep it in doggy bags to be brought back to base camp. At the same time, rising temperatures are making trash collection more dangerous. Ice is weakening, crevasses are widening and meltwater within the Khumbu Glacier - situated between base camp and Camp 1 - is causing ice blocks to collapse more quickly. At lower altitudes, the Khumbu Icefall at the head of the glacier "is by far the most dangerous part of the mountain, and towards the end of the season, it starts to melt," said Tenzing David Sherpa, a director at Asian Trekking, which employs about 30 Sherpas. "It is much safer for drones to bring down the waste." The Chinese drones, which cost $70,000 each, can fly in temperatures of minus-20C and brave wind speeds of more than 40 kmh. Asian Trekking said it would pay for Airlift's equipment and trash delivery services if the drone company decides to officially offer them commercially. Even so, there are limitations. Drones aren't able to reach higher campsites, where the air is too thin to fly. Weather at high altitude can also be erratic, and during a flight in April, a drone automatically deployed a parachute when wind speeds hit more than 60 kmh. The machine was then dragged and damaged by further gusts. The accident highlighted the need for specialized insurance before expanding the project, according to Tshering Sherpa, SPCC's chief executive officer. Such policies are not currently readily available and "if we don't have any insurance, it is a very high-risk project," he said. Airlift, which is working with Nepalese authorities, is planning to try more drone models on Everest and the country's other 8,000-meter peaks, said co-founder Milan Pandey. At least five drone manufacturers from the US and Europe have already reached out to Airlift offering their equipment for testing, Pandey said. At these altitudes, "we're the only company in the world doing this operation." (Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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Scroll.in
3 days ago
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Mount Everest: A new route avoids treacherous Khumbu Icefall in safer path to summit
Each spring, climbers from around the world converge at Everest's South Base Camp in Nepal, hoping to summit the world's tallest peak. For the Sherpas guiding them, the journey grows deadlier each year. Rising temperatures are destabilising the Khumbu Icefall, the most treacherous part of the climb. A Nepali-French team has been working on a new route that may offer a safer path up Everest, their work offering a glimpse of how mountain communities are adapting to a warming world. At lower altitudes, this new route winds through rock rather than ice, featuring a mix of permanent via ferrata infrastructure – steel steps drilled into the rock and fixed ropes to provide added security for climbers. In particular, the route is intended to protect Sherpas, whose work as guides requires them to make the ascent multiple times during each climbing season with different expeditions. It will be the first new path to the summit from Nepal since Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary established the current route with their historic 1953 ascent. Concerned by the growing risks posed by Everest's unstable icefall, French mountaineer Marc Batard and Nepali mountaineer Kaji Sherpa began working on establishing this alternative route in 2022. After facing delays due to bad weather, the route is expected to be completed in the autumn, though financing difficulties have thrown up another obstacle. At nearly 8,850m, Mount Everest, situated within Nepal's Sagarmatha National Park, is the world's highest mountain above sea level, and attracts hundreds of mountaineers hoping to reach the summit each spring. The Department of Tourism issued 479 Everest climbing permits in 2023, 421 in 2024 and at least 444 this year. But the mountain is also succumbing to climate change. Rising temperatures are thinning glaciers, forming supraglacial ponds and destabilising the current icefall route. Experts say that if climate change continues at this rate without sufficient preservation of glaciers, the safety of climbers and Sherpas, and livelihoods of local people, will be threatened. Glacial activity Mount Everest, in the Central Himalayas, is part of the Hindu Kush Himalayas range. A recent study by the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development found that the Himalayan glaciers in the Hindu Kush Himalayas region disappeared 65% faster in 2011-2020 compared with the previous decade. This acceleration signals a dramatic shift in glacier behaviour. Closer to Everest, the Khumbu Glaciers, while not retreating rapidly, are steadily thinning, experts say. A study analysing six decades of glacier mass change around the mountain found that ice loss has increased consistently since the early 1960s, with glaciers thinning by more than 100 metres. This has direct consequences for mountaineers who rely on the Khumbu Icefall to access Mount Everest and neighbouring peaks Lhotse (8,516m) and Nuptse (7,855m). Most dangerous passage The Khumbu Icefall is the fastest-moving section of the 15km-long Khumbu Glacier and is riddled with crevasses and towering seracs. 'Khumbu Icefall doesn't stay in one place after the ice breaks down. It is not stable,' Kaji Sherpa tells Dialogue Earth. 'When huge pieces of ice break, crevasses are made. Due to icefall, accidents happen on [the] route.' The climbing season of Spring 2014 was one of the deadliest, after an avalanche in the icefall killed 16 Sherpas, bringing the climbing season to a halt. 'With climate change, there are increasing chances of loss of life at the Khumbu Icefall,' Kaji Sherpa notes. Warming temperatures are also accelerating changes on the glacier's surface. Researchers have observed the emergence of supraglacial lakes – pools forming on top of the ice. These can act like 'heatsinks, that eat away the ice, and slowly merge to form larger proglacial lakes [that form in front of or next to a glacier],' explains Tenzing Chogyal Sherpa, a Kathmandu-based cryosphere analyst for International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development. One such proglacial lake, Thyanbo, triggered a glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) last August, causing severe damage to Thame Village in the Everest region. This pattern of glacial lake expansion suggests that internal glacier temperatures are slowly rising. A 2017 study found that the coldest ice in the Khumbu Glacier was two degrees celsius warmer than the mean annual air temperature. This means the internal temperature of the ice was warmer than the air outside, says Chogyal Sherpa, who contributed to the research. 'Glaciers are warming up from the inside and might be more vulnerable to even minor atmospheric warming,' he explains. New route The via ferrata infrastructure, with fixed ropes, offers a more secure alternative to the unpredictable Khumbu Icefall. Already widely used in the Alps, via ferrata routes offer a scalable solution to the dangers posed by climate change. It presents 'a solution to mitigate the risk of fatal accidents and a solution [to ensure] sustainable and adap[tive] mountaineering tourism in the Everest region,' says Antoine Erout, an expedition member for the new route. The route begins from Gorakshep (5,140m), the last camp for meals on the existing route before South Base Camp, ascending an old trail toward Sundar Peak (5,880m), a path last used decades ago, bypassing the Khumbu Icefall (5,486m). It then reaches the ridge of Nuptse, before an abseiling descent of several hundred metres in the west valley of Everest to rejoin the normal route to Everest Camp 1 (6,065m) and the summit, says Theo Livet, an expedition member who directed a documentary about the route, with another on the way. 'There will be fixed ropes on the via ferrata section for security, and some fixed ropes at points along the path where a fall could be dangerous,' Livet tells Dialogue Earth. These are used with a jumar – a portable handle clamped onto a rope – for additional safety. A mix of vertical climbing and trekking, the route allows some flexibility. 'You can walk on the rocks; you don't have to take the vertical climb,' Livet notes, adding that the vertical climb helps porters carry provisions to higher camps more quickly. The bypassing of Khumbu Icefall is crucial especially as the growing influx of climbers could destabilise the ice on the existing Nepal route. 'Increased foot traffic on the already unstable ice formation accelerates the compaction and cracking of the ice surface continuously,' notes Mohan Bahadur Chand, a glaciologist and assistant professor at Kathmandu University's Department of Environmental Science and Engineering. 'This, along with waste [left by climbers], speeds up the melting along the route, leading to weakening of fast-moving icefalls [such as Khumbu], which is currently accelerated by the increased temperature and changes in precipitation patterns.' However, the ability of the expedition to complete the route may be in jeopardy. Last month, Batard announced in a Facebook post that the team were unable to complete the route during their latest journey due to a lack of funding, and called on the Nepali government to commit to financing the project. Talks are now ongoing, with the hope of reaching an agreement. Climate change in the Himalayas Sherpas interviewed by Dialogue Earth describe how the Khumbu Glacier has changed over the years. 'It is one of the busiest glaciers in the world,' says Chogyal Sherpa of Khumbu Glacier, on which many mountaineers, tourists and workers live for over three months. 'You won't find such density of people living on a glacier for a long time [anywhere else].' This prolonged human presence is also affecting the glacier's climate. 'The unpredictability and extremity of weather events – unseasonal snowfall, no snow, heavy snow, too much rain, and sometimes no rain at all – is becoming more frequent,' explains Chogyal Sherpa. 'Snow on the mountains has been melting, exposing rocks,' adds Pasang Nuru Sherpa, who has been guiding the expedition for the new route. 'This increases the risks of rock falling, putting lives in danger.' Despite these dangers, Sherpas must continue working. 'We have to raise our families, and risk our lives,' he says. As Phurba Tsering Sherpa, a tea house owner on the South Base Camp trail whose grandfather summited the mountain 10 times, puts it: working on Everest, there is a 50-50 chance between survival and death. These odds led Phu Chettar Sherpa to leave his job as an icefall doctor after seven years, during which he re-fixed ropes at around 5,000m elevation each season due to the shifting of the Khumbu Icefall. 'My family was unhappy with that kind of job because of safety concerns,' he says. 'Glaciers in general react very fast to variations in climate; the Khumbu Icefall is not an exception,' says Erout, adding that 'it has become much more hazardous and sensitive to global warming'. Future of mountaineering In recognition of growing global threats to the cryosphere, the UN declared 2025 the International Year of Glaciers' Preservation, with March 21 designated as World Glaciers Day. Few places symbolise the urgency of glacier loss more starkly than on Khumbu Icefall, where new crevasses and seracs are formed each season as ice recedes. 'No profession is as close to glaciers as mountaineers,' Tenzing Chogyal Sherpa tells Dialogue Earth. 'Mountaineers climb them, interact with them and walk on the glaciers. They are at the forefront of the climate crisis. Their profession is at the mercy of the weather.' Over the years, Chettar Sherpa, the former icefall doctor, has noticed troubling changes. He notes that peaks like Island Peak (6,165m) and Lobuche Peak (6,119m) in the Sagarmatha National Park now appear more like kalo patthar (black rocks), with little to no snowfall in winter. Even the Nepali Everest trail is turning 'more and more rocky' – particularly near Crampon Point, where the Khumbu Icefall begins, he says. These changes increase risk for climbers. 'Depending on the evolution of the Khumbu Icefall and possib[ility] of serious accidents with climbers, the new route could soon[er] or later become the normal route to Everest,' says Erout. The broader impacts of climate change are also affecting local livelihoods. In Lukla, the main gateway to the Everest region, the weather is notoriously unpredictable. The airport's operationality is weather dependent, says Chogyal Sherpa. 'Bad weather can lead to backlogs, causing cascading effects on bookings,' threatening the region's tourism-dependent economy, he notes. As climate change accelerates, bringing more erratic and extreme weather – and with it, rapid glacier thinning – the stakes are greater than mountaineering. What's under threat is the entire future of mountain life itself – its economies, communities and ecosystems. 'Climbing is the primary income of the local people, and restricting climbing [due to] increased risk [from climate change] will directly affect them and the country's overall tourism,' says Chand. He warns that there will be 'ecological and cultural consequences in terms of water availability for local communities, agriculture, hydropower, and traditional life may be altered'. Chand notes that a global reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to pre-industrial levels is key to slowing down the effects of climate change on glaciers, snow and permafrost. 'We have no alternatives,' he says. 'If [ice melting continues], even a new route won't be sustainable due to the increased risk in these highly fragile environments.'
