Mount Everest

Mount Everest, on the border between Nepal and China, is the highest mountain above sea level on Earth, at 8,848.86 metres according to a joint survey in 2020. Its summit is made of limestone that formed on the floor of an ancient sea, and contains fossils of small sea creatures.^[1] The highest point on Earth is therefore an old piece of sea floor that has been pushed up by about nine kilometres, and has kept the shells.

Still rising

Everest was formed, and is still being pushed up, as the Indian tectonic plate pushes north into the Eurasian plate. The mountain is thought to be rising by a few millimetres a year, though erosion and earthquakes also affect its height.^[2] Every measurement of Everest is therefore, very slightly, already out of date.

The highest point is not the same as the tallest mountain. Mauna Kea in Hawaii, measured from its base on the sea floor, is more than ten kilometres tall, but most of it is underwater. The summit of Chimborazo in Ecuador, because the Earth bulges at the equator, is the point on Earth's surface furthest from the centre of the planet. Everest wins only on the question it was asked.

The name

The mountain was named in 1865 by the Royal Geographical Society after Sir George Everest, a former Surveyor General of India, who had not asked for it and reportedly objected. He also pronounced his name “Eve-rest”, not the way the mountain is now usually said. The mountain already had local names, Chomolungma in Tibetan and Sagarmatha in Nepali, which it continues to use.

• Height: 8,848.86 m (2020).
• Summit rock: marine limestone.
• Rising: a few mm a year.
• Named after someone who: objected.

See also

• Mountain – the general idea
• Ocean – where its summit used to be
• Hill – a much smaller version

References

1. Summit, S. (2020). 8,848.86. Plate Press.
2. Fossil, F. (1999). “Shells at the Top”. Himalayan Geology 1: 1.
3. Survey, G. (1865/2006). I Did Not Ask for This. Fictional reprint.