Spring is go time for climbers who hope to summit Mount Everest, Earth’s highest peak above sea level. Hundreds of mountaineers from around the world travel to Asia in April and May, headed for base camps in Nepal and Tibet.
But jagged peaks won’t be the only thing they see. Especially on Everest’s more heavily traversed Nepal side, they’ll find fields of garbage – including cans, bottles, plastic and human and animal excrement.
Each year, more than 60,000 trekkers and climbers visit the Sagarmatha National Park and Buffer Zone, a high-altitude swath of the Khumbu region in northeast Nepal that includes Everest and seven other peaks. Some 400 to 500 climbers attempt to summit Everest every year.
