Huge chunk of glacier blocks Everest route

Friday, April 24, 2026

A huge, unstable chunk of glacier is blocking the route up Mount Everest from Base Camp in Nepal just as peak climbing season gets under way in the Himalayas. "Icefall doctors" " who fix ropes and ladders on the lower part of the route up the world's highest peak - can find no way round the 100-foot-high (30m) block of ice just under Camp 1. They say the only option is to wait for the ice block, called a serac, to melt " which they hope will happen within days.

Posted by REDIAL at 12:42 AM | 6 COMMENTS | permalink | Comment on This Entry |

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The icefall doctors work for the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee (SPCC) that is responsible for securing ropes as far as Camp 2 on Everest, which stands 8,848.86m (29,031 feet) above sea level. They reached Base Camp three weeks ago. By this stage in April they would normally have fixed the route as far as Camp 3, but are still blocked by the chunk of glacier about 600m below Camp 1.

Comments

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Climbing Mt Everest has never been easy.

It has always been faced with challenges.

#1 | Posted by LampLighter at 2026-04-24 12:45 AM | Reply

It has always been faced with challenges.

These days it's mostly overcrowding and traffic jams at the pinch points. The summit season is pretty short.

#2 | Posted by REDIAL at 2026-04-24 12:56 AM | Reply

@#2 ... These days it's mostly overcrowding and traffic jams at the pinch points. ...

Not to mention the garbage that the climbers leave behind them on the trails ...

#3 | Posted by LampLighter at 2026-04-24 01:12 AM | Reply

@#3

Mount Everest's highest camp is littered with tons of garbage. Cleanup will likely take years (2024)
www.pbs.org

... The highest camp on the world's tallest mountain is littered with garbage that is going to take years to clean up, according to a Sherpa who led a team that worked to clear trash and dig up dead bodies frozen for years near Mount Everest's peak.

The Nepal government-funded team of soldiers and Sherpas removed 11 tons (24,000 pounds) of garbage, four dead bodies and a skeleton from Everest during this year's climbing season. ...

#4 | Posted by LampLighter at 2026-04-24 01:15 AM | Reply

Not to mention the garbage

And the melting ice is bringing back garbage from decades ago, on top of the new stuff. Also many O2 bottles.

#5 | Posted by REDIAL at 2026-04-24 01:23 AM | Reply

Are we including the corpses in the garbage?

#6 | Posted by sentinel at 2026-04-24 08:32 AM | Reply