Some records are meant to be broken, but sometimes there are records that are best left unchallenged. The former record-holder for being the oldest person to climb Mount Everest died this weekend as he attempted to reclaim the record.
Min Bahadur Sherchan of Nepal became the world’s oldest person to climb Mount Everest in 2008 at the age of 76. His record lasted five years. Yuichiro Miura of Japan broke the record in 2013 at the age of 80. Determined to win back the record, Scherchan planned one more conquest of Mount Everest at the age of 85, but he never got past the base camp. A case of altitude sickness was to blame for his death.
“Doctors said he died of natural causes. There was water in his lungs because of altitude sickness,” Shiv Raj Thapa of Summit Nepal Trekking “>said to AFP after an autopsy.
Scherchan’s mission to reclaim the record became a worldwide story, and was even covered by Inside Edition.
Scherchan was waiting at the mountain base for the weather to clear up. This was because he wanted to attempt the climb in one stage rather than break up the climb at different points. That sounds crazy, but Scherchan believed it would be best for his body if he did so in order to use less energy overall. Unfortunately, this mission to reclaim the record never got off the ground as he succumbed to what the doctors referred to as natural causes.
As a result of this unfortunate sequence of events, the record still remains Miura’s.
