Qomolangma - because it's there

[Randy W]

from the Sixth Tone

 

Measuring Mount Everest, the Rooftop of the World

Chinese surveyors are en route to the peak to assess the mountain’s height, which may have shrunk after the 2015 Nepal earthquake.

 

 

Why is China remeasuring Everest?

Everest sits atop one of the world’s most active tectonic zones: the juncture of the Indian and Eurasian plates, which are continually moving and colliding with each other. As a result, the mountain’s height may have changed over the years.

Some scientists speculate the magnitude 7.8 earthquake that struck Nepal in 2015 may have shrunk Everest by about an inch.

“Current estimates suggest Everest is 2.5 to 2.6 centimeters shorter than it was before the earthquake,” Dang Yamin, a geologist at the Chinese Academy of Surveying and Mapping, told Sixth Tone’s sister publication The Paper. “Current measurements are indirect results obtained via satellites, for example. We need to measure its height directly at the peak to determine the impact of the earthquake.”

According to Zhang Peng, a surveying expert at China’s National Geomatics Center, surveyors on the current mission plan to set a beacon with several reflective mirrors attached on the summit. Then, scientists at a lower elevation will measure the slope distance to the top and calculate the height.

In addition, the team will carry equipment to retrieve location data from satellites, including China’s homemadeBeiDou Navigation Satellite System. Climbers also plan to carry a radar to measure the thickness of Everest’s snowcap.

 

 

[Randy W]

from iChongqing on Facebook - lots of coverage for this trip

https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1726485947499096&id=1145429832271380

Quote

An 8-member Chinese surveying team set off to reach the summit of #MtQomolangma from a camp at an altitude of 8,300 meters early Wednesday morning to complete the mission of remeasuring the height of world's #highest peak. People's Daily, China

 

Edited December 21, 2020 by Randy W (see edit history)

[Randy W]

from National Geographic - Qomolangma grows a pair

Mount Everest is more than two feet taller, China and Nepal announce

Based on parallel surveys conducted by the two countries, the new height measurement is not yet set in stone as scientists and mapmakers prepare to analyze the findings.

Quote

Technological peaks

In 1856, mathematician Radhanath Sickdhar found that Everest is the highest mountain in the world while he was working for the Great Trigonometrical Survey, a project dedicated to surveying and mapping the Indian subcontinent. Since then, a handful of surveys have sought to pin down the mountain’s true height with the best technology available at the time.

Until the advent of satellites, surveyors used a device called a theodolite, a precision optical instrument mounted on a tripod, for measuring angles between two designated points. Lugging their heavy equipment from hilltop to hilltop, a survey team would incrementally measure Everest’s height from sea level, zig-zagging north from the Bay of Bengal until they could see the peak.

A 1954 survey using a similar technique calculated that Everest stands at 29,028 feet above sea level, a number that is still recognized by many countries and map publishers.

Then in 1999 a survey led by cartographer and explorer Bradford Washburn, and sponsored by the National Geographic Society, was the first to use GPS technology to measure the Everest summit. That team’s work delivered an altitude of 29,035—the figure still in use by the Society until the new measurements can be fully verified.

http://www.china.org.cn/english/culture/49094.htm

"It is time for the Western world to respect us Tibetans by recognizing the highest peak on Earth by its Tibetan name, Qomolangma," he says.

"This is also a call to the international Tibetology community to use Tibetan names for Tibetan things."

Edited December 21, 2020 by Randy W (see edit history)

[Randy W]

Mount Everest climbers posted firsthand accounts of getting Covid – from being airlifted away to taking photos in their hospital beds. But officials in Nepal, which is struggling from a dire outbreak and vaccine shortage, said they were just rumors.

from the NY Times on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/5281959998/posts/10152716291404999/

He spent a week at the hospital and six days at home, and then was back at base camp. Experienced guides like him from Nepal’s high-mountain-dwelling Sherpa community were in short supply because of the pandemic, and the expedition company stood to lose thousands of dollars if the prince’s climb were canceled.
So, with his body still fighting the vestiges of the virus, Mr. Sherpa, 38, most likely became the first person with Covid-19 to stand on Everest’s pinnacle when he led the prince and 15 others there at dawn on May 11. By the end of the climbing season early this month, at least 59 infected people had been on the mountain, including five others who reached the top, according to interviews with climbers and expedition companies and the personal accounts of social media users.
 

Dozens Came Down With Covid-19 on Everest. Nepal Says It Never Happened.
Climbers posted firsthand accounts of being infected, but officials in Nepal, which relies on tourism revenue, dismissed them as rumors.

[Randy W]

Footage from drone flown 400 metres over Mount Everest blows everyone's minds
A team of climbers and photographers launch a DJI Mavic 3 drone from the summit of Mount Everest and capture jaw-dropping vision

from T3.com

(Image credit: DJI and 8KRAW)

The mind-blowing vision was filmed by Chinese vision company 8KRAW(opens in new tab) using a DJI Mavic 3, a high-performance drone known for its capabilities in extremely technical and challenging conditions such as those encountered at high altitudes, and a 4/3 CMOS Hasselblad camera.

The release of the film, simply titled Flying over Everest and jointly produced by DJI and 8KRAW, is the culmination of several years’ work on the world’s mightiest mountain. Check out the footage here:

 

[Randy W]

Marvelous east Rongbuk Glacier houses secret ice sculpture garden

from CGTN

Above the altitude of 6,000 meters in the Qomolangma region lies the east Rongbuk Glacier. The frozen grandeur consists of countless ice towers, stalactites and stalagmites, with about 8 trillion cubic meters of ice in the whole Third Pole region.

 

[Randy W]

Mt. Qomolangma is the main summit of the Himalayas. Follow the lens of Xinhua journalists to enjoy the splendid and magnificent scenery of the Himalayas at the altitude of 5,200 meters to 8,400 meters above sea level https://english.news.cn/20230527/c64024e8490c4be4a0926d0a092f83ae/c.html

 

from Xinhua Culture&Travel on Facebook 
https://www.facebook.com/XinhuaTravel/posts/pfbid02gMsZgHo4GtEz6DgCaWu25E4mGRvsaJmtDQRKesN8Sa6njZrWTzpukRRWXzHumEFsl

 

FlyOverChina | Aerial view of Mount Qomolangma and Himalayas in SW China's Tibet

Edited September 21, 2023 by Randy W (see edit history)

[Randy W]

China bars top US climbers from entering Tibet

from the Himalayan Times

Quote

 

American climbers Conrad Anker and Jimmy Chin have been denied access to Tibet while a group of Nepali and American mountaineers today left for Kerung to begin an expedition on Mt Everest from the northern route. Conrad, team leader of the ski expedition, returned to Kathmandu from the Kerung border after Chinese authorities rejected his visa request, sources said.

Jimmy, head of the filming group, has also not been granted a Tibet visa till date. The ski expedition funded by National Geographic Society was locally managed by Elite Exped.

Following the Beijing's denial for a Tibet permit request, sources claimed that Jimmy Chin has already reached Beijing to negotiate with the Tibetan authorities.

According to sources, the expedition will have Nepali, American and Chinese members.

 

 

[Randy W]

Yeah, its true. This is to update you all that the World's Highest Motorable Road "Umling la Pass" @19024 feet (5883 meter) in the extreme remote Himalayas is now officialy open for foreign nationals and now you can Ride The Himalayas to the highest motorable road in the world. You will be actually riding higher than the everest base camp.

Earlier This was not officially and legally open for foreign nationals due to being at a stretegic defence zone for Indian army at the Indo-China border.

from Ride The Himalayas on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/ridethehimalayas/posts/pfbid09dDN8zUJo67RAvRMxJ9rC4JSK9KXgmDYC2PavBS8YdHw3exgWHarQygnCMBFFAHFl

 

[Randy W]

We are at the rooftop of the world. There are times when it's hard to beleive that you actually been to a place like this. 
For those who have not been there and did not witness the magnificence of the Himalayas and it is unreal looking adventure and might find it hard to believe. However you gotta be there to see it and to feel it.

from Ride The Himalayas on Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/ridethehimalayas/posts/pfbid0vuHEVaU6D3HpUNNs4MD5viy6c3RBB4adx3Nr7DsefpYypyUqJuikqBZptm88Q4Y6l