Mount Everest - Thirty climbers sick on Everest after two death

About 30 climbers have suffered frostbite or become ill on Mount Everest, after two more died from apparent altitude sickness.

Despite the danger, the mountain's most successful female climber reached the summit for the seventh time on Friday. Lhakpa Sherpa, a Nepalese woman now living permanently in the US and working in a convenience store in Connecticut, who reached the peak from Tibet on Friday - breaking her own record for the most Everest climbs by a woman.

This climbing season is the first since an earthquake in Nepal last year that killed at least 18 people on Everest.

Dutch climber Eric Ary Arnold dies on Friday after reaching the summit, while on Saturday, 34-year-old Australian woman Maria Strydom also died while descending from the peak. They are the first fatalities of the season.

Indian climbers Paresh Nath and Goutam Ghosh also went missing on Saturday, Wangchu Sherpa from the Trekking Camp Nepal agency in Kathmandu told the Associated Press.

Gyanendra Shrestha, a Nepalese official at Everest Base Camp said, snow blindness, altitude sickness and fatique are very common health issues at high altitudes, although most people recover once they descend the mountain.

 

However, it is not unusual from here to be a few deaths from these conditions every season, in addition to deaths from accidents and other reasons, he said.




source:
The Guardian