display

Kathmandu (AP) - Mount Everest has gained notoriety for being the highest garbage dump in the world.

According to estimates by the Nepalese army, there are 140 tons of waste on the 8,848.86 meter high mountain.

There are broken tents and items of clothing, food packaging, stoves, empty water bottles, beer cans and oxygen bottles that adventurers left behind for decades.

In addition, there would be around 40 tons of human waste - and more than 300 corpses that mountaineers even use as trail markers.

Now environmentalists want to exhibit works of art made from non-recyclable Everest rubbish by artists from several countries in a new museum and thus draw attention to the big problem, as the head of the project, Phinjo Sherpa, told the German Press Agency.

The museum near the base camp is due to open in autumn.

display

There have been several initiatives by environmentalists and the government to reduce Everest litter - albeit with limited success.

You also have to fight against more and more visitors to the world's highest mountain in the Himalayas, who, exhausted from the ascent and descent in thin air, always leave something behind.

In 1979 there were 3,600 foreign trekkers and mountaineers in the Everest region; in 2018 there were 60,000, according to the organization behind the museum project, Sagarmatha Next.

In addition, there are often many local Sherpa guides and porters.

However, according to the authorities, no one has been on Everest for about a year.

At the beginning of the pandemic, climbing was initially forbidden for months.

With a recently announced cleaning campaign, Nepal's army wants to use the tourist-free time to remove 35 tons of rubbish from Mount Everest and five other Himalayan mountains from April to June.

Non-biodegradable material will then be handed over to recycling companies in the capital, Kathmandu.

display

Companies that organize expeditions now have to demand a deposit of 4,000 dollars (around 3300 euros) from tourists, which is deducted if they are caught leaving rubbish on the mountain.

A manageable amount considering the costs of an average Everest ascent and descent, which costs around 40,000 euros each, as US mountaineer and blogger Alan Arnette calculates.

This includes amounts for a permit to climb the mountain, equipment, tents, domestic flights, food, oxygen bottles and a local team of helpers.

At the same time, there are certain rewards for people who bring garbage down the mountain.

Sherpa helpers get about $ 130 for an empty oxygen bottle.

This can then be reused.

In the same way, for example, beer bottles and cans can be recycled in the capital Kathmandu.

Oxygen cylinders and tents in good condition are also bought by companies, according to the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee.

Plastic packaging or paper was partly burned near the base camp.

A few expedition companies have also given their Sherpas incentives to carry human waste back down, says the experienced mountain guide Kami Rita Sherpa.

The climbers often did their business near their camps - and then used ice to boil water.

The excretions could spread diseases, he says.

It is now forbidden to do business outdoors in the base camp.

But at higher altitudes, where life and death are at stake, collecting human waste is not a top priority for many.

display

When people die on the mountain, they are often left there.

Rescuing a corpse is difficult and expensive, and costs between 25,000 and 60,000 euros, says mountaineer Arnette.

Usually a team of six to ten experienced Sherpas move out with oxygen bottles, and a helicopter finally flies the corpse from the mountain.

Some families also left their dead relatives there because they loved the mountain so much.

© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210311-99-773470 / 2

Press conference of the Nepalese army

Everest plaster campaign 2019