Mt Everst and The Vicotoria Falls: A closer look.
Mount everest isn't only the tallest mountain in the world, it's also one of the most dangerous mountains to climb. To date 210 people have died while trying to conqour the monstrous peak.
Conditions are so difficult in the "death zone" that most corpses have been left where they fell, some of which are visible from standard climbing routes.
Camp 4 on the picture or the fourth traingle is the ledgendary "death zone."
Even if you do succesfully climb mt everest there may be many scars which you will have to bear. One of the most famous of these would be frostbite. Frostbite occurs when human tissue is exposed for long periods of time to cold weather. The damage which frostbite causes does not depend on how cold the temperature is but how long the human tissue has been exposed.
If skin is exposed to cold temperatures for hours at a time then a lot of damage will be caused even if the temperature is just below freezing.
The consumption of alcohol helps frost bite. Along with impairing judgement, alcohol slows the blood circulating throughout the body, making the damage to exposed skin that much worse.
So mountineers climbing Mt Everest need to make sure that their toes and fingers are always kept warm for fear of getting frostbite.
Hypothermia is also caused by long exposure to the cold. Hypothermia occurs when the body temperature drops by one or two degrees. You may think that this shouldn't cause much damage but the result is disasterous. The human body needs to maintain a temperature of 37°C and if this drops by one or two degrees, the various organs throughout the body are put at risk.
Hands and toes become numb because of a lack of circulating heat.
If the hypothermia becomes more aggresive, simple tasks with your hands will become impossible as the muscles are failing to work. The body will try to focus all of its remaining heat on keeping the vital organs warm, leaving a victim pale and fingers, toes, ears and lips turn a light blue.
If the Hypothermia becames worse, the body will shut down. The body is now at a cold temperature of 32°C. Major organs begin to fail as the remianing heat in the body is used up.
So who was the first person to reach the summit of Mt Everest?
It was the brave Sir Edmund Hillary who placed his foot on the top of the world first. He did this on the 29th of May 1953.
However Sir Geroge Everest was the first person who correctly recorded the height of Mt Everest. Due to this fact the Ameriacns called it Mt Everest in his honour.
Did you know?
Mt Everest rises a few milimetres every year due to geological forces! So the tallest mountain in the world is always becoming taller!
The Victoria Falls.
The falls are situated on the Zimbabwe river in South Aferica.
The Victoria Falls is an astounding 1708 metres wide making it the largest curtain of water in the world!
An unbelievable amount of water powers into the Zambezi gorge. The estimate figure would be 550,000 cubic metres per minute!
The local people call the falls "Mosi-oa-Tunya" which means the smoke that thunders.
During the flood season (February to May, peaking in April) The spray from the falls rises an amazing 400 metres and occasionly double that height! This spray can be seen up to 30 miles away!
However during the flood season, it is impossible to see the foot of the falls as they are constantly shrouded in mist. The walkways on the opposite sides of the falls are also covered in the mist from the falls.
As you can see from this picture, the falls are completly covered with mist.
The resulting mist plume of these falls is a great source of rainbows. When the sun penetrates through the mist, a rainbow can be clearly seen stretching over the falls.
The minimum flow of the falls, which occurs in November, is only a mere tenth of the flow in April!
The river's course is dotted with many islands.
There are two islands which split the curtain of water even at full flood season. These islands are called Boaruka Island and Livingstone Island.
When it isn't flood season, many more islands are revealed and these also split the curtain of water into many rivers and streams
Unlike many waterfalls, there are no mountains surrounding this mighty waterfall. However there is a flat plateau stretching out in all directions for kilometres.
If your brave enough, you can also bungee jump from these falls! However you must contact a bungee jumping instructer to avail of this experience.
