Older Climbers More Likely to Die on Everest

Forbes online has some bad news for climbers who have been waiting for decades for a shot at Mt. Everest.
Sixty may be the new 40, the magazine reports, but when it comes to scaling the world’s mightiest peak, it’s a few years too late. Forbes directs our attention to a study of more than 2,200 people who tried to climb
29,030-ft. Mount Everest during the spring seasons from 1990
through 2005. The research, conducted by a University of Washington biologist, found that  the overall chance of reaching the summit was 31
percent but only 13 percent for climbers in their 60s. The overall
risk of dying on the world’s tallest mountain was 1.5 percent
but five percent for climbers 60 and older. Among climbers who made it to the summit, 25 percent of those
age 60 and older died before they completed their descent compared
with 2.2 percent of young climbers.
Read more in Forbes online.