There Is Too Much Poop On Everest

Ever wondered what happens when nature calls on Mt. Everest?

Occam's razor tells us the simplest hypothesis is most likely, so if you guessed, "it just gets left up there," congratulations, you nailed it.

But now, the sheer volume of human waste abandoned on the world's highest peak has reached a level that could actually become more dangerous than the perilous climb itself.

Ang Tshering, chief of Nepal's mountaineering association, told the Associated Press, "climbers usually dig holes in the snow for their toilet use and leave the human waste there."

When you consider that more than 4,000 climbers have ascended the 29,000-foot mountain over the past 62 years, well... you don't need to be a mathematician to know that's a lot of waste.

Since 2008, there has been a concerted clean-up effort, with climbers now required by law to carry at last 8 kilograms of garbage back down to base camp.

Even still, Grinnell College estimates "26,500 pounds (12,020 kg) of human excrement" are expelled each season. Sherpas must then bag it and carry it to a frozen lake bed at 16,942 feet.

As you would imagine, this has effectively poisoned the base camp's main water source.

In a 2012 opinion piece from the Washington Post, Everest, the once proud monument to the heavens, is now, less flatteringly, called "a fecal time bomb [due to] the mess... gradually sliding back toward base camp."

For this writer, the already-horrifying prospect of rock climbing just became even less appealing.