# Any other hobby activity as deadly as climbing Everest? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 22, 2016, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396 "2016-05-22T20:28:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/1 "2016-05-22T20:28:38Z")
Climbing Mount Everest is no walk in the park, but you can buy a trip there and several hundred go each year. Since 2000 the fatality rate as been about 1.4 per 100 visitor (including those who have to turn back without reaching the summit) according to Wikipedia. Is there any other single destination/activity that has a death rate that high? ---
**Author:** ![chacoguy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/50afbb/32.png) [@chacoguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chacoguy)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/2 "2016-05-22T20:33:28Z")
Those [flying squirrel suits](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatalities_due_to_wingsuit_flying) might be close. ---
**Author:** ![TommySeven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@TommySeven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TommySeven)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/3 "2016-05-22T20:43:07Z")
This might quickly become a definitions game. In Everest’s favor, it’s (a) really dangerous, (b) popular enough that you get a reasonable statistical sample, and © famous enough that mountaineers will take a disproportionate share of their “total lifetime mountaineering risk” to reach the summit, concentrating the total danger of their hobby in that one event. Just looking at mountains, Annapurna is much deadlier than Everest. Climbing Annapurna isn’t exactly a “hobby”, but climbing Everest probably isn’t (or shouldn’t be) either. You could probably also find e.g. a particular BASE jumping location that’s deadlier than Everest, but with a smaller sample size. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/4 "2016-05-22T20:51:15Z")
Ten deadliest hobbies, with death rates, according to this site: [Top 10 Deadliest Hobbies - Toptenz.net](http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-deadliest-hobbies.php) 1. 1. Bungee Jumping - 1 in 500,000 2. Scuba/Deep Sea Diving - 1 in 200,000 3. Skydiving - 1 in 160,000 4. Ski Jumping - 1 in 8,333 5. Heli-Skiing - 1 in 5560 6. Cliff Diving/Base Jumping - 1 in 2,317 7. Boxing - 1 in 2,200 8. Summit/Rock Climbing - 1 in 1750 \* 9. Motocross/Motorcycle Racing - 1 in 1,000 10. Hang Gliding - 1 in every 1,000 - The web site also notes the following: > [@](#): > > However, if we just counted mountain climbing in Nepal, then this would be the number 1 deadliest hobby on Earth, with a death rate of 1 in 167! ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/5 "2016-05-22T21:02:31Z")
I think “civilian astronaut” beats Everest. There have only been a small handful of them, less than 10 by my accounting, so the death of Christa McAuliffe implies a death rate of \>10%. ---
**Author:** ![TommySeven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@TommySeven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TommySeven)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/6 "2016-05-22T21:07:53Z")
So maybe to refine the question: Is there an activity that, compared to climbing Everest, (a) is undertaken by at least as many people every year, (b) concentrates the risk of dying in a similar period of time (a few hundred hours?), where that period is deliberately chosen by the participant, (c) reasonably counts as a hobby (not suicide, not military service, etc.), and (d) kills at least as great a fraction of those who undertake it? I suspect that the answer may be no. There are experimental aircraft that may have been as deadly as Everest, like the [Revolution Mini-500](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolution_Mini-500), but I can’t find any that are as deadly and as popular. Maybe some particular subset of recreational drug use, if that counts? ---
**Author:** ![Poysyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f4b2a3/32.png) [@Poysyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Poysyn)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/7 "2016-05-22T21:49:49Z")
Not as bad, but what about that freshwater deep cave diving? I know it’s a rare hobby, but definitely seems like something I would avoid (seriously, I get a little anxious whenever I have to put on the full chemical warfare get-up for gas hut training). ---
**Author:** ![John\_DiFool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_difool/32/19543_2.png) [@John\_DiFool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_DiFool)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/8 "2016-05-22T22:06:20Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > I think “civilian astronaut” beats Everest. There have only been a small handful of them, less than 10 by my accounting, so the death of Christa McAuliffe implies a death rate of \>10%. 34 deaths out of 450 spacefarers = 1 in 13. ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/9 "2016-05-22T22:11:39Z")
> [@TommySeven](#): > > So maybe to refine the question: Is there an activity that, compared to climbing Everest, (a) is undertaken by at least as many people every year, (b) concentrates the risk of dying in a similar period of time (a few hundred hours?), where that period is deliberately chosen by the participant, (c) reasonably counts as a hobby (not suicide, not military service, etc.), and (d) kills at least as great a fraction of those who undertake it? I suspect that the answer may be no. It is a bit unfair to include (a), because among tall mountains, Everest is vastly more popular even though it is not the most dangerous: > **[Eight-thousander](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-thousander#List_of_Eight-thousanders)** > > The eight-thousanders are the 14 mountains recognized by the International Mountaineering and Climbing Federation (UIAA) as being more than 8,000 metres (26,247 ft) in height above sea level, and sufficiently independent of neighbouring peaks. There is no precise definition of the criteria used to assess independence, and at times, the UIAA has considered whether the list should be expanded to 20 mountain peaks by including the major satellite peaks of eight-thousanders. All of the eight-thousa... Other mountains have death rates of up to 32% (compared to Everest’s 4%), but far fewer people ever attempt them. Wouldn’t it be fairer to measure lethality in deaths/hour or maybe something like a “[micromort](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromort)” (chances of death per million of something)? [http://skydiving-encyclopedia.com/wiki/skydiving/10-fears-of-falling-risks-safety/10-2-risk-death/how-dangerous-is-skydiving/](http://skydiving-encyclopedia.com/wiki/skydiving/10-fears-of-falling-risks-safety/10-2-risk-death/how-dangerous-is-skydiving/) Under that rating, taking an Ecstasy pill is 0.5 micromorts and an Everest attempt is 12,000 to 32,000 micromorts depending on source. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/10 "2016-05-22T22:11:57Z")
> [@TommySeven](#): > > Maybe some particular subset of recreational drug use, if that counts? Krokodil users, perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/11 "2016-05-22T22:29:32Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > Wouldn’t it be fairer to measure lethality in deaths/hour or maybe something like a “[micromort](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micromort)” (chances of death per million of something)? If you measured danger on a per-hour scale, deep sea diving would go way up. Mountain climbing can turn from “we’re doing fine” to “oh crap oh crap oh crap” within hours, but in diving, you’re thinking in seconds. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/12 "2016-05-22T22:40:56Z")
> [@TommySeven](#): > > This might quickly become a definitions game. In Everest’s favor, it’s (a) really dangerous, (b) popular enough that you get a reasonable statistical sample, and (c) famous enough that mountaineers will take a disproportionate share of their “total lifetime mountaineering risk” to reach the summit, concentrating the total danger of their hobby in that one event. > > Just looking at mountains, Annapurna is much deadlier than Everest. Climbing Annapurna isn’t exactly a “hobby”, but climbing Everest probably isn’t (or shouldn’t be) either. You could probably also find e.g. a particular BASE jumping location that’s deadlier than Everest, but with a smaller sample size. For every 100 who have summitted K2, 29 have died, while for Everest it’s 4/100. That’s some stiff odds. ---
**Author:** ![TommySeven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@TommySeven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TommySeven)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/13 "2016-05-22T22:45:13Z")
> [@Reply](#): > > It is a bit unfair to include (a), because among tall mountains, Everest is vastly more popular even though it is not the most dangerous: To make this an interesting question, I think you have to consider popularity. Otherwise, it just devolves into rare activities that happened to kill almost everyone who tried them. “At least as popular as Everest” might go too far, though. Maybe a lower arbitrary cutoff, or some kind of weighted measure that considers both deadliness and popularity? Drug use numbers are tricky. Like, even if “drinking” counts as a hobby, does “drinking and driving”? And I’m pretty sure it’s easy to find drugs that beat Everest by all my measures except (b), but “1% chance of dying at some random point over the next year, if I keep doing this” feels like a different kind of choice from “1% chance of dying today”. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/14 "2016-05-22T22:45:56Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > If you measured danger on a per-hour scale, deep sea diving would go way up. Mountain climbing can turn from “we’re doing fine” to “oh crap oh crap oh crap” within hours, but in diving, you’re thinking in seconds. And the particular variant of [competitive freediving](http://www.outsideonline.com/1896841/open-your-mouth-and-youre-dead)has an especially high fatality rate. > [@](#): > > Nobody has ever drowned at an organized freediving event, but enough people have died outside of competition that freediving ranks as the second-most-dangerous adventure sport, right after BASE jumping. The statistics are a bit murky: some deaths go unreported, and the numbers that are kept include people who freedive as part of other activities, like spearfishing. But one estimate of worldwide freediving-related fatalities revealed a nearly threefold increase, from 21 deaths in 2005 to 60 in 2008. ---
**Author:** ![TommySeven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@TommySeven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TommySeven)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/15 "2016-05-22T23:01:44Z")
> [@Aspidistra](#): > > If you measured danger on a per-hour scale, deep sea diving would go way up. Mountain climbing can turn from “we’re doing fine” to “oh crap oh crap oh crap” within hours, but in diving, you’re thinking in seconds. That depends what hours you count. I’d start from a moment where you deliberately take the action that puts you in danger (ascend into the death zone, swim into the underwater cave, etc.), and stop when you’re dead or out of danger. I wouldn’t start from a moment where you realize that you’re in unexpected danger, since that would include e.g. the time from noticing that a car is about to hit you, while out for a low-risk stroll, to getting hit by that car. Maybe the question is “in what recreational activity do participants voluntarily expose themselves to the greatest danger, in micromorts per day, according to their best rational estimate of that risk”? ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/16 "2016-05-22T23:05:02Z")
Russian Roulette - 1 in 6 ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/17 "2016-05-22T23:37:54Z")
11 of 23 people died going over Niagara Falls … but not all of them were hobbyist … and that doesn’t include the fella who receive a lifetime ban on entering Canada, as bad as that is, it’s not death. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/18 "2016-05-22T23:44:05Z")
these days you don’t need experience to climb Everest, you just need the cash to pay guides. For other big mountains I don’t believe someone will take you along if you are not experienced. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/19 "2016-05-22T23:49:07Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > these days you don’t need experience to climb Everest, you just need the cash to pay guides. For other big mountains I don’t believe someone will take you along if you are not experienced. Right. Jon Krakauer’s _Into Thin Air_ hypothesizes that the Everest death rate is so high because rich people can pretty much pay to climb even if they are not ready. Usually it goes ok, but with no experience you can quickly succumb to a disaster. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2016, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396/20 "2016-05-22T23:57:48Z")
I read in one of the Freakonomics books that riding horses is much more dangerous than people generally realize. If you work it out by the hours people spend doing it, riding a horse is more dangerous than riding a car or riding a motorcycle. That said, danger in this statistic was defined as death or serious injury not death alone. I don’t have the figures but I would imagine you’re less likely to be killed in a horse accident than in a motorcycle or car accident. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-other-hobby-activity-as-deadly-as-climbing-everest/755396.md?page=2)