• The highest point in the world is at 8848m (29,035 feet)
• Everest was formed more than 60 million years ago
• Sir Edmund Hilary and Tenzing Norgay were the first to conquer Everest, on May 19 1953.
• George Everest, Surveyor General of India from 1830 to 1843, discovered Everest in 1841. In 1865, the mountain was renamed in his honour from its original name of Peak XV.
• It is almost 28 times the size of the Burj Al Arab, and will be 12.5 times the height of the Burj Dubai tower
• The peak of Everest is shared by Nepal and Tibet and climbers can scale the mountain from either side
• It rises a few millimetres each year due to geological forces.
• Over 2000 people have reached the top of Everest.
• There are around 120 dead bodies of climbers on the mountain.
• Avalanches are the greatest cause of death for climbers scaling Everest.
• The summit is just below the cruising height of a jet
• The youngest person to reach summit was 13 and the oldest 70
• In Nepal the mountain is called Sagarmatha, meaning 'forehead of the sky'
• In Tibetan the mountain is known as Chomolangma for 'mother of the universe'

Above 25,000 feet, the air at Everest holds only a third of oxygen of sea level. This results in an increased chance of hypothermia, frostbite, high-altitude pulmonary, when lungs fill with fluid, and high altitude cerebral edema, when the brain swells up. Even with bottled oxygen climbers experience symptoms such as fatigue, impaired judgment and coordination, headaches, nausea, double vision and sometimes hallucinations. Some experienced climbers have braved conquering Everest without the need of oxygen.

The Death Zone

This term generally refers to mountain ascents above 8000m (26,250 feet). Above this altitude the amount of available oxygen present in the air is roughly one third of that at sea level and is insufficient to sustain human life. As climbers ascend, the body adapts by a process of acclimatization with the manufacture of additional red blood cells. To sustain normal sufficient oxygen transport in the blood, the heart needs to beat faster and breathing is deeper and more rapid. Non-essential bodily functions are shut down. 

The process of acclimatization occurs over a period of days or even weeks. If ascent is too rapid, the adaptation process does not occur. Serious consequences can result including high altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE) and high altitude cerebral edema (HACE) where fluid builds up in the lungs and brain respectively. At altitudes above 7,500 meters (24,600 feet), sleeping and digestion of food become very difficult and the risk of HAPE or HACE increases greatly. In the "death zone" at 8,000 meters (26,250 feet) and higher, acclimatization is impossible. Climbers attempting 8000m summits enter the zone and on summiting, descend as quickly as possible.

There are only 14 peaks in the world that are higher than 8000m and only 12 people in the world have climbed all 14 peaks.

Mountain peak	Range	Location	Height
Everest Himalayas Nepal/Tibet 29,035 8,850 K2 (Godwin Austen) Karakoram Pakistan/China 28,250 8,611 Kanchenjunga Himalayas India/Nepal 28,169 8,586 Lhotse Himalayas Nepal/Tibet 27,940 8,516 Makalu Himalayas Nepal/Tibet 27,766 8,463 Cho Oyu Himalayas Nepal/Tibet 26,906 8,201 Dhaulagiri Himalayas Nepal 26,795 8,167 Manaslu Himalayas Nepal 26,781 8,163 Nanga Parbat Himalayas Pakistan 26,660 8,125 Annapurna Himalayas Nepal 26,545 8,091 Gasherbrum Karakoram Pakistan/China 26,470 8,068 Broad Peak Karakoram Pakistan/China 26,400 8,047 Gasherbrum Karakoram Pakistan/China 26,360 8,035 Shishma Pangma (Gosainthan) Himalayas Tibet 26,289 8,013