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A gondola ride to Everest would be awful. A quick ascent to that height would virtually guarantee some pretty awful side effects for most passengers. I certainl
by codyb 12y ago
A gondola ride to Everest would be awful. A quick ascent to that height would virtually guarantee some pretty awful side effects for most passengers. I certainly wouldn't want to be on it.
- forrestthewoods 12y agoDon't be so pedantic. You know what he meant. That an easy way for people to visit the top of the mountain would be great.
- nodata 12y agoI read somewhere you can do that today with a helicopter.
- npongratz 12y agoMillions of people ascend to the height of Everest's summit every day, extremely quickly. I imagine that such a purpose-built gondola would, like modern jets, have a pressurized cabin.
- arethuza 12y agoI'd go for a solution inside the mountain - maybe a train (like the Jungfrau - not to the top though) or a funicular then a elevator to take you to the very top (like Les Deux Alpes - though that is a glacier dome rather than a peak).
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- codyb 12y agoMillions of people haven't even summited Everest (much less everyday, can you imagine? It's like Dane Cook's skit about thousands of firefighters). The numbers around 4,000 according to a quick google search. And it's a multi day trip with plenty of acclimatization stops. Not only that but 100s of those 4000 have perished. It's not some trivial walk around the park just because it's not considered one of the hardest summits in the world. As for whether or not the gondola would be a good thing, I guess that'd depend on a lot of feasibility studies and cost analysis (cost to the environment, to the local populations way of life, monetary costs).
- arcticfox 12y agoYou clearly didn't catch the crux of his point - millions of people fly in passenger jets every day at Everest's elevation. All you'd need to do is pressurize the gondola, and there'd be no need for acclimatization.
- codyb 12y agoOh yea, actually, I see now, my mistake.
- mcguire 12y ago"Millions of people haven't even summited Everest..." Millions of people travel in commercial airliners every day, at altitudes greater than the summit of Everest.
- ajays 12y agoWhat's the point of the gondola, then, if you can't step out? If you just want to sit in a metal cabin and enjoy the view, you might as well go in a plane.
- snowwrestler 12y agoSo why do we need the gondola at all? If people just want to hit 29,035 feet above sea level, they can take a plane anywhere in the world. What makes the top of Everest interesting to visit is that to do it, a person has to overcome very difficult natural challenges. So a gondola to the top would destroy the very value it was supposed to provide.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- dredmorbius 12y agoThat's a problem already for passengers on China's Qinghai-Tibet railway line, whose highest station is above 5,000m (16,600 feet). The railroad cars offer enriched oxygen and supplemental oxygen, though they're not pressurized. Edema is a real possibility. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qinghai%E2%80%93Tibet_Railway https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qinghai%E2%80%93Tibet_Railway Or this travelog: http://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/HIGH-TRAIN-TO-TIBET-World-s-highest-railway-is-2547632.php http://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/HIGH-TRAIN-TO-TIBET-Wor... As the altimeter approaches 17,000 feet, a package of potato chips balloons outward until it ruptures a seam. Sunscreen and hand sanitizer erupt unbidden from bottles. In soft sleeper class, Chinese businessmen sprawl listlessly on their bunks, sucking oxygen from plastic hoses. The bathrooms smell of vomit.