http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001007/od/everest_skier_dc_1.html
I wonder how long it took to get down?
Wow…I’m really surprised. I thought we were going to be able to watch him die via satellite feed… (not that I wanted to.)
I can’t say that I’m shocked that he ran across a dead body. IIRC, everyone that dies on everest (at least past a certain elevation) stays there. It’s not practical to take people back down, and it serves as a warning for the other climbers.
Good for him… hope noone tries to follow and gets killed.
According to Paul Harvey news, it took him five hours to ski down Mt. Everest.
Andygirl,
What's surprising is the lack of decay. There was a documentary last year that showed the body of Mallory and while it was dried out, it was not all that rotted - you could show it on TV, and he's dead 75 years...his partner was never found. In * Into Thin Air * the author writes of an later expedition asked to bring back keepsakes from bodies (a ring to a climber's widow, etc) but the bodies were left.andygirl:
I’ve heard that too. You’d think a climber’s courtesy would evolve, such that, whenever anyone finds a body on Everest, they tug it ten yards or a hundred downslope, whatever they feel able to do without hindering their main purpose.
As many people as climb Everest these days, in a few years all the corpses would be recovered and buried.
IIRC it’s a respectful gesture that the bodies are left. They leave them doing what they wanted most to do, or something.
–Tim