Going Up

Back in New Delhi last week, after his Swiss climbing expedition gave up just 900 ft. short of Mt. Everest's summit (TIME, March 31), Mountaineer Edouard Wyss-Dunant described a new difficulty facing future Everest climbers. The world's highest mountain, he announced, is getting higher all the time.* Although Everest's altitude is officially listed in India's records at 29,002 ft., the Swiss had expected to find it 81 ft. higher than that. But when they got there the mountain proved even higher by their calculations--29,610 ft. Wyss-Dunant's advice to Everest aspirants: "Anybody who wants to reach the top better hurry, because it gets harder every year."

*A theory supported by geologists, who are aware of the continual upthrusting of the earth's crust in India's lofty Himalayan range.

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