Among the rankings of the world's highest peaks, Mount Everest is definitely second to none, with an altitude of 8848.86M. No peak can surpass it.
Mount Everest
Experts said that the top of Mount Everest is covered with snow all year round and the temperature is extremely low. Under such environmental conditions, people will not rot after death. Is this true? Can we find the bodies of those ancient people on it?
Icy mountain peaks
The higher the altitude, the lower the temperature. The specific relationship is as follows: for every 100 meters of altitude increase, the temperature drops by 0.6 degrees Celsius.
The temperature decreases with the increase of altitude.
Theoretically speaking, if the sea surface temperature of Mount Everest is 0 degrees Celsius at this time, then the temperature of its coldest place is about minus 53 degrees Celsius.
This temperature can be described as extremely cold. Except for some remote towns in northern Russia and the North and South Poles, few places on the earth can reach this temperature.
With global warming , temperatures around the world continue to increase, and it is difficult for most people to feel how cold the temperature is.
Let's give a simple example. If you hold a basin of warm water and splash it outdoors, the warm water will freeze immediately, forming a magnificent landscape.
The town of Oymyakon, located in Yakutsk, northeastern Russia, is such an existence. In this place, the lowest temperature in history once reached minus 60 degrees Celsius.
The coldest city on earth
Local people do not dare to go to the toilet in the wild. Even at home, they have to build a cold insulation measure to resist the cold wind.
Due to various factors, the temperature of Mount Everest is higher than theoretically.
Because the higher the altitude, the greater the amount of radiation received, and the greater the heat received.
At an altitude of about 7,500 meters, the average temperature in the coldest month is as low as minus 27 degrees Celsius, and the coldest temperature does not exceed minus 40 degrees Celsius.
Of course, this is cold enough for everyone. If the ancients unfortunately died while climbing the mountain, would their bodies be preserved to this day?
1975 Mount Everest Climbing Route Map
Corpses of Ancients
I regret to tell you that this is not possible.
First of all, the ancients did not have the ability to climb Mount Everest.
It may be hard for you to imagine how difficult it is to climb Mount Everest. What climbers have to face is the hypoxic environment at high altitudes, harsh climate conditions, steep cliffs, etc.
Once encountering wind and snow, climbers have to slow down their progress.
In ancient times with backward technology, they had neither good climbing tools nor suitable means of keeping out the cold. Coupled with the thin oxygen environment, it might be difficult for them to even reach the main peak.
Even today with the development of modern science, few people can climb this mountain.
In 1920, a British mountaineering team challenged Mount Everest for the first time. As a result, they retreated due to the harsh environment at an altitude of more than 6,000 meters.
Climbers at the beginning of the last century
In 1922, the second British mountaineering team set out. They reached a height of 8,200 meters, but they paid a heavy price with the lives of seven people.
In the following decades, many climbing enthusiasts wanted to challenge Mount Everest, and they all paid a heavy price.
Countless failure cases tell us that challenging Mount Everest is definitely not as simple as everyone thinks.
Secondly, if you want to enter the snow-covered area where the body can be preserved, you need a higher altitude.
Due to differences in precipitation, there are differences between the north and south snow lines of Mount Everest. The snow line on the south slope is 5,500 meters and the snow line on the north slope is 5,700 meters.
Mount Everest Environment Map
Depending on the season and temperature, the height of the snow line fluctuates, but it always hovers between 5,000 meters and 6,000 meters.
Therefore, there are thick layers of ice only above 5,500 meters. These ice layers are excellent raw materials for preserving corpses.
I would like to ask, are there really ancient people able to climb to this area?
Finally, Mount Everest also does not have the conditions to seal the body .
The environment of Mount Everest
In terms of temperature, if you want to reach a temperature that prevents corpses from decaying, it must be at least minus 30 degrees Celsius, and the temperature must be stable.
In history, there was the famous "freezing human" technology. In order to preserve the body better, they used liquid nitrogen at minus 196 degrees Celsius to freeze the human body.
Cryonics concept diagram
The temperature fluctuations on Mount Everest are not small. In summer, in some areas with an altitude of about 7,000 meters, there will even be "high temperatures" of minus 10 degrees Celsius.
At these temperatures, the body is at risk of thawing and quickly decaying.
From the perspective of natural conditions, as long as there are microorganisms in the environment and the temperature is suitable, it is impossible for the body to not rot.
Judging from the climate and environment of Mount Everest, it is only a matter of time before the corpse rots, but the corpse will rot more slowly.
If you want to find an environment without microorganisms, then there is only distant space.
Maybe you can try to go to the cold Pluto , where there is a low temperature of more than minus 200 degrees Celsius, and even the virus cannot move.
Pluto animation
So even if there is a one in 10,000 possibility that the ancients climbed up and died, it would be difficult for us to find the body.
From a biological perspective, if human corpses are exposed in the wild, they are likely to be eaten by some local animals.
In such a harsh environment, the shortage of food is a big problem. They will seize every opportunity to eat and never miss any means of obtaining protein .
Human corpses naturally cannot survive the disaster.
Currently, the most famous corpse found on Mount Everest is "Green Boots" .
People have not confirmed his identity from the remains, but it is almost the same as the climber Zewang Pajo in 1996.
His body was frozen in a snowfield, still retaining the movements he made during his lifetime.
Climber Zewang Pazo in green boots
Experts speculate that Pazuo was probably frozen to death while was sleeping. Since it was not that long ago, the body has not yet rotted.
But others were not so lucky. Previously, people had discovered rotten human corpses on Mount Everest, and their identities could not be identified.
The resting body of Mount Everest
Although no ancient people have been found on Mount Everest so far, scientists can still find the remains of certain organisms with scientific research value.
A mysterious mummy was unearthed in the Alps of distant Europe.
The Alps
The mummy on the snowy mountain
People named him Oz the Iceman .
Research found that this corpse is likely to come from 5,000 thousand years ago, a period when the four ancient civilizations prospered.
Judging from the bows and axes beside the Iceman Oz, he should have been a hunter during his lifetime, hunting near the Alps.
But the death of Oz the Iceman was particularly strange, more like committing suicide . Italian scientists used the latest medical imaging technology to restore the images of his life.
You can search for the picture of Oz's body
and found that Oz's death was caused by an arrow in the back, which caused excessive bleeding in the body and induced heart disease , which eventually led to death.
Of course, some scientists believe that the ax next to the Iceman Oz was the cause of his death. There may be some primitive residents living in the Alps. They used the Iceman Oz as a sacrifice to and killed him. There are still many controversies related to
, but this is not the crux of the issue.
The greatest value of Oz the Iceman is that certain things in his stomach are so well preserved that scientists can detect chemicals from them.
Based on the test results, scientists can infer the era in which Oz the Iceman lived and their living habits.
Laboratory testing technology
can also derive the culture and dietary life of people of that era, which is of great help to us in uncovering the mysterious history of .
