French climber Marc Batard, Sherpa to explore new ‘safer’ route to Everest

KATHMANDU: A four-member team comprising a renowned French climber and a Sherpa, is set to explore a new route to Mt Everest (8,848.86 metres). So far, 176 aspiring mountaineers have obtained permits for the Mt Everest expedition this spring and the number of climbers is expected to rise, according to the Department of Tourism. While most of the expedition team are bound to climb the top of the world via conventional route starting from Khumbu Icefall, the team including French national Marc Batard (70), his two sons and Lakpa Nuru Sherpa are all set to climb the top of the world via a new route which they claim to be safer than the existing one. The team identified the new route last year which is rocky, unlike the icy and treacherous Khumbu Icefall. They are testing the feasibility and plausibility of the newly discovered route this year. The existing route — South-East ridge — starts from Everest Base Camp at 5,364m. The new route, according to Marc, will begin at 5,164m from Gorakhshep — the last human settlement in the Khumbu region. The team will climb via the new rocky route that lies eastward from the existing path and crosses the foothill of adjoining Mt Nuptse (7,864m). The teams then will climb down about 300m to reach Camp I of Mt Everest located at 6,065m. The French team last year identified a new alternative path from Gorakhshep to an altitude up to 5,500m. They also conducted an aerial survey of the route. The newly explored route will bypass the gorge, glacier streams, ever-shifting ice sheet in Khumbu Icefall and deep crevasses thereby averting chances of accidents along the route. To date, 40 climbers and support members Sherpa have died in Khumbu Icefall area alone since the maiden successful summit of Everest in 1953 by Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary. In a programme organised on Thursday, Sherpa said that he was supporting the French team to address the question — isn't there a different, newer and safer route to the summit of Everest? Their mission is to validate the safety of the newly discovered route so that more and more mountaineers would choose the new route in future and help prevent fatalities from occurring in the riskier Khumbu Icefall section. A technical panel under the government-formed Tourism Revival Steering Committee to revitalise tourism sector in the country sees the attempt of this team as an opportunity to introduce a new and safer route to Everest. The Panel's coordinator, Rajaram Giri, is hopeful that the newly discovered route would help revive Covid 19 affected tourism sector. According to him, the new route gives new hope and confidence to aspiring mountaineers. "Once validated, the government should give recognition to the route and permit should be issued for commercial expeditions," he viewed. Marc had set a record by climbing Mt Everest in 22 hours 29 minutes in 1988. He aspires to become the oldest person to climb Everest without supplemental oxygen this year. Likewise, Sherpa has already climbed Everest 14 times to date. The French mountaineer is collaborating with Sherpa to prove that the new route to Everest is safer as coming back home safely is equally important as reaching atop the mountain. (With inputs from RSS) READ ALSO:

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