The South Summit is a subsidiary peak of

Mount Everest Mount Everest (), known locally as Sagarmatha in Nepal and Qomolangma in Tibet, is Earth's highest mountain above sea level. It lies in the Mahalangur Himal sub-range of the Himalayas and marks part of the China–Nepal border at it ...

in the

Himalayas The Himalayas, or Himalaya ( ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the Earth's highest peaks, including the highest, Mount Everest. More than list of h ...

between the

South Col The South Col is a col between Mount Everest and Lhotse, the highest and fourth-highest mountains in the world, respectively. The South Col is typically swept by high winds, leaving it free of significant snow accumulation. Since 1950 (when Tibe ...

(at ) and the main summit (at ) above sea level. Although the South Summit's elevation of is higher than the second-highest mountain on Earth ( K2 at ), it is not considered a separate mountain as its

topographic prominence In topography, prominence or relative height (also referred to as autonomous height, and shoulder drop in US English, and drop in British English) measures the height of a mountain or hill's summit relative to the lowest contour line encircling ...

is only 11 meters.

Overview

The South Summit is a dome-shaped peak of snow and ice approximately distant from the summit of Mount Everest and below it, connected to it by the Cornice Traverse and

Hillary Step The Hillary Step was a 40-foot vertical rock face that sat above sea level on the southeast ridge of Mount Everest. Located halfway between the "South Summit (Mount Everest), South Summit" and the true summit, the Hillary Step was the most te ...

. It was first climbed by Charles Evans and

Tom Bourdillon Thomas Duncan Bourdillon ( ; 16 March 1924 – 29 July 1956) was an English mountaineer and member of the 1953 British Mount Everest Expedition which made the first ascent of Mount Everest. He died in Valais, Switzerland, on 29 July 1956 aged 32 ...

of the

1953 British Mount Everest expedition The 1953 British Mount Everest expedition was the ninth mountaineering expedition to attempt the first ascent of Mount Everest, and the first confirmed to have succeeded when Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary reached the summit on 29 May 1953. ...

on 26 May 1953. They arrived at 1 pm, too late to continue on because of problems with Evans' oxygen set. Three days later, on 29 May,

Edmund Hillary Sir Edmund Percival Hillary (20 July 1919 – 11 January 2008) was a New Zealand mountaineering, mountaineer, explorer, and philanthropist. On 29 May 1953, Hillary and Sherpa people, Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the Timeline of M ...

and

Tenzing Norgay Tenzing Norgay (; ''tendzin norgyé''; May 1914 – 9 May 1986), born Namgyal Wangdi, and also referred to as Sherpa Tenzing, was a Nepalese-Indian Sherpa mountaineer. On 29 May 1953, he and Edmund Hillary were the first confirmed to ...

passed over the South Summit en route to achieving the main peak.

History

On reaching the

in 1953, expedition leader John Hunt was struck by the sight, writing "Above us rose the South Summit of Everest ... an elegant snow spire, breathtakingly close yet nearly 3000 feet above our heads ... none of us had been prepared for any spectacle quite so sharp, quite so beautiful as this. To me it seemed that a new and unsuspected peak of alpine stature stood above the South Col." A geologist with the 1965 Indian Everest expedition discovered a deposit of fossils of seashells in limestone about 100 feet above the South Summit. Recounting his first ascent of Mount Everest without supplemental oxygen in 1978,

Reinhold Messner Reinhold Andreas Messner (; born 17 September 1944) is an Italian climber, explorer, and author from the German-speaking province of South Tyrol. He made the first solo ascent of Mount Everest and, along with Peter Habeler, the first ascent o ...

described the South Summit as "quite a milestone for me". During the

1996 Mount Everest disaster The 1996 Mount Everest disaster occurred on 10–11 May 1996 when eight climbers caught in a blizzard died on Mount Everest while attempting to descend from the summit. Over the entire season, 12 people died trying to reach the summit, making i ...

, mountain guide

Rob Hall Robert Edwin Hall (14 January 1961 – 11 May 1996) was a New Zealand mountaineer. He was the head guide of a 1996 Mount Everest expedition during which he, a fellow guide, and two clients died. A best-selling account of the expedition was ...

and three other people died at the South Summit while descending from the main summit in an unexpected

blizzard A blizzard is a severe Winter storm, snowstorm characterized by strong sustained winds and low visibility, lasting for a prolonged period of time—typically at least three or four hours. A ground blizzard is a weather condition where snow th ...

. Hall survived overnight, and established radio contact the following day, but froze to death later that day, May 11, 1996. His body remains on the South Summit. The South Summit is a popular place for Everest climbers to pause, change oxygen bottles, and turn around if necessary. From this location the cornice traverse,

, and summit can be seen in clear weather. Everest kalapatthar crop

References

External links

PBS article about different locations on Everest including the South summit
{{Eight-thousander Mount Everest Mountains of Koshi Province Mountains of Tibet Eight-thousanders of the Himalayas