Everest Gets an Altitude Adjustment: Nepal and China Agree on Height (wsj.com) 107
How tall is Mount Everest? Until now, it depended on whom you asked. China said it was 29,017 feet. Nepal said it was a little taller, at 29,028 feet. The countries have closed that 11-foot gap and reached an agreement. From a report: The world's tallest peak this week will get a new, unified official height from the two nations it straddles. After yearslong surveys, China and Nepal will announce the peak's stature Tuesday, Susheel Dangol, the man in charge of Nepal's Everest-measurement project, said Sunday. "The challenge for us was to prove we could do it," he said. Measuring Everest has always been a challenge, taxing the latest surveying technology since the 1800s. And it created a disagreement between the mountain's two homelands. The difference was over rock versus snow. China's official height for Chomolungma -- its Tibetan name for Everest -- was 29,017 feet, from a 2005 survey. China used "rock height," estimating where the peak lay under the snow. Nepal has used a "snow height" of 29,028 feet for the peak it calls Sagarmatha, from a 1954 survey India did. That's where people stand, atop the snow, and the measure is standard practice in most countries. One of the first official measurements of Everest unveiled globally was in 1855 (29,002 feet). Until a 1975 official measurement by China (29,029 feet), the surveys were by foreigners.
For Slashdotters (Score:5, Funny)
China said it was 29,017 feet. Nepal said it was a little taller, at 29,028 feet.
I think we can all agree it's between 43.97 and 43.98 furlongs.
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What's that in Libraries of Congress stacked on top of each other?
It's about the size of Wales, if you tipped it on its side.
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That they shouldn't let third party candidates into debates?
Re:For Slashdotters (Score:5, Insightful)
Dunno about Nepal, but quite unlikely for China to measure anything in feet or furlongs. They used to use chi and li, now they use gonchi and gongli, which are exactly a meter and a kilometer, which is what the civilized world has been using for a while.
Re: For Slashdotters (Score:4, Funny)
Exactly - "feet" as a unit of measurement are pretty ridiculous. Personally, I prefer knowing that Everest us about 0.0000000000009352063 light years high.
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This is a very speculative measure, as we do not know with certainty what the speed of light is. Nobody has measured anything but a roundtrip speed, and nobody knows the conditions on the whole path for the duration of the experiment. They are assumed to be what we'd like, but are they? Nobody knows. They even stopped measuring it recently and declared it to be a nice, round number.
Also, it isn't "Mount Everest", the name is Chomolungma.
Metric (Score:5, Informative)
China said it was 29,017 feet. Nepal said it was a little taller, at 29,028 feet.
Since both of those countries are metric I doubt either of them said anything of the sort. China has claimed it was 8,844.43 metres in the past and Nepal claimed 8,848 metres.
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the kid from T2?
He was 13 when they made that. Is that his adult height?
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I thought we had all agreed on using Empire State Buildings for this?
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A detail seems to be missing (Score:5, Insightful)
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I expect a 10 foot monolith appeared there and they agreed to use that for its height.
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As to not spread rumors, my statement isn't backed by any facts what so ever. I didn't even read TFA and only skimmed the summary.
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There's a monolith on Everest this morning? Cool!
More likely, "very cold". :-)
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They compromised on sending a team up with snow shovels so there's nothing to disagree about anymore.
8848.86 (Score:2)
They used 2 teams starting from different sides (i.e. different sea base), both using multiple peaks for reference, plus BeiDu satellite (GPS equivalent), I guess the result 8848.86 is the result of several measurements with different errors each etc.
No, I don't know how many that makes in feet or elbows.
That reminds me, when I drive on motorways in the UK and see the signs like "Services 5m" I always yell at my British gf "5m? WHERE? WHERE? I CAN'T SEE IT, IS IT TINY?". She is not very amused.
Highest, not tallest (Score:2, Insightful)
Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain in the world, measuring 10,211 m (33,500 ft)
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By your logic, Everest is even taller than that. It goes down to the bottom of the Mariana trench.
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I contend that a more even way to determine the significant height of a mountain is to measure from the top of the mountain to the lowest surrounding point (once the slop starts to point upward you are now looking at another object/mountain). This would make Mauna Kea the tallest mountain.
It does not seem appropriate to award additional height to a mountain that sits on top of a highly elevated continental plate, just like we would not say that buildings in Denver, CO are taller than Burj Khalifa simply b
Re:Highest, not tallest (Score:4, Interesting)
I contend that a more even way to determine the significant height of a mountain is to measure from the top of the mountain to the lowest surrounding point (once the slop starts to point upward you are now looking at another object/mountain). This would make Mauna Kea the tallest mountain.
No, it wouldn't, except if it is a perfect slope but most likely, you have to go uphill by at least 1 cm to cross a rock on your way down. So by your own definition, Mauna Kea stops there. And now we are talking about a second mountain, Mauna Kea rock #349872394872398472, which does down to Mauna Kea rock #324235465565656.
It does not seem appropriate to award additional height to a mountain that sits on top of a highly elevated continental plate
Why not? A mountain can't have a plate surrounding at the middle of its height?
just like we would not say that buildings in Denver, CO are taller than Burj Khalifa simply because there roofs sit 5000+ feet above sea level.
A mountain is not a man-made structure. Where is the base of mount Everest? You could argue it is below sea as well, and that large parts of India and China are on mount Everest itself as well...
Everest can remain as the highest point on the surface of the earth, but I think we should re-evaluate height of mountains and not base it simply on elevation above sea level.
That's what prominence is for. And Everest is the most prominent mountain on earth as well... Mauna Kea is #15.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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I contend that a more even way to determine the significant height of a mountain is to measure from the top of the mountain to the lowest surrounding point (once the slop starts to point upward you are now looking at another object/mountain). This would make Mauna Kea the tallest mountain.
No, it wouldn't, except if it is a perfect slope but most likely, you have to go uphill by at least 1 cm to cross a rock on your way down. So by your own definition, Mauna Kea stops there. And now we are talking about a second mountain, Mauna Kea rock #349872394872398472, which does down to Mauna Kea rock #324235465565656.
Interesting idea about measuring height from some notion of a base. If that were accepted, perhaps we would see massive trench building around mountain bases in order to raise the official heights of those mountains.
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Interesting idea about measuring height from some notion of a base.
The accepted base is the sea level for mountain height and highest col for prominence.
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Fine, just prove that Mauna Kea is a mountain by doing that thing you do with mountains: Climb it.
Of course, as it's barely above sea level you won't be needing oxygen support.
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Wikipedia even differentiates between the tallest and highest, so we can have it both ways.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Everest is #1 in both lists, just like it should be.
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Only because the Pacific is in the way. They list Mauna Kea:
"Most of the volcano is underwater, and when measured from its underwater base, Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain in the world, measuring 10,211 m (33,500 ft) in height."
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Yes, but they don't say how the base is defined. Again, how is the base of the Everest NOT at the deepest spot in the pacific?
That's probably written by someone from Hawai/USA wanting to brag about having the "tallest mountain". It's far from being universally agreed. There is no list of the "tallest" mountains after Mauna Kea.
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Topographic prominence is not the same thing as "highest". If you have two mountains that abut one another in the middle of a plain, the topographic prominence of the shorter of those two mountains is the height from the valley between the mountains, which may be hundreds or even thousands of feet above the plain.
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why should the "highest" of a mountain be counted from that plain? What's wrong with the valley you describe (prominence ) or sea level (elevation)?
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Nothing is wrong with any of those approaches. They are just different, in much the same way that a hot dog, a hamburger, and a roast beef sandwich are all foods, but a hot dog is not a sandwich. :-)
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Just to clarify, elevation is "highest", prominence is tallest as perceived from the nearest local minimum, and peak height above average terrain is tallest in a broader sense.
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, and peak height above average terrain is tallest in a broader sense.
That's the problematic definition. There is no list of "tallest" mountains from that definition because you can't define what is "average terrain".
Why would Everest stop in Nepal (or India or China, whatever), and not at the sea level, or even below it?
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, and peak height above average terrain is tallest in a broader sense.
That's the problematic definition. There is no list of "tallest" mountains from that definition because you can't define what is "average terrain".
If that's true, then you also can't define where a mountain begins. If you can define the edge of the mountain, you can define the average height of the terrain around it. It is the average height of the areas that are adjacent to the base of the mountain. If you want to be sane, though, in the case of a mountain that abuts another mountain, you should only consider parts that are not abutting another mountain. For simplicity, though, the easiest approach would be to use the minimum altitude of any poin
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That's the problematic definition. There is no list of "tallest" mountains from that definition because you can't define what is "average terrain".
If that's true, then you also can't define where a mountain begins.
Exactly. That's why we measure them down to sea level. Or by prominence, which, in case of Everest and Mauna Kea, goes again down to sea level. Not below.
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That's the problematic definition. There is no list of "tallest" mountains from that definition because you can't define what is "average terrain".
If that's true, then you also can't define where a mountain begins.
Exactly. That's why we measure them down to sea level. Or by prominence, which, in case of Everest and Mauna Kea, goes again down to sea level. Not below.
The problem is that prominence is something of a misnomer. The name implies that it is how prominent a mountain is, i.e. how much it sticks up. But it's actually a terrible metric when applied to the tallest mountain in an area, because if there is no taller mountain nearby, a mountain's prominence is measured from sea level. Thus, Everest's prominence is greatly inflated compare to its actual size when viewed from its base solely because it happens to be the tallest mountain nearby, even though it is ac
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Again, why can't there be a plateau at the middle of a mountain? Why must it have a constant downhill slope?
I think prominence is just fine. Everest deserve to be the most prominent mountain on earth. It's also the highest, the tallest, whatever.
So what is it? (Score:2)
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Then its appearance on Slashdot today is rather silly, isn't it, especially with a headline "Everest Gets [present tense] an Altitude Adjustment". A more correct headline would have been "Everest to Get [future tense] a New Altitude on Tuesday". At least then we can all adjust our expectations for instant gratification.
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"At least then we can all adjust our expectations for instant gratification."
You must be new here.
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Yes. And also I don't believe China or Nepal are using imperial units... The world out there uses the metric-system!
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"Given that the article itself is behind a paywall, the least the summary could do was mention the agreed-upon height."
You can never, ever confess to having RTFS or God forbid, TFA.
Feet? Made for walking... (Score:3, Funny)
The number of feet would depend on the path one takes to reach the summit, no? The height of the mountain has been 8848 meters since I first learned about it, as a kid, and it has remained that way ever since.
That is the advantage of metric units. They are independent on the path taken to reach the summit.
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No. The height is determined from the base (whatever is designated as the base of the mountain) to the top, as if you drew a straight line from top to bottom. No walking involved.
That is the advantage of metric units. They are independent on the path taken to reach the summit.
But apparently unrelated to common sense when determining how things are measured.
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No. The height is determined from the base (whatever is designated as the base of the mountain) to the top, as if you drew a straight line from top to bottom. No walking involved.
Then why involve feet? That defies common sense.
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I'm presuming this was a poor attempt at humor, trying to equate "feet" with "walking distance".
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"The height is determined from the base (whatever is designated as the base of the mountain) to the top"
The "base" you describe, according to the wikipedia list, is defined as:
The prominence of a peak is the minimum height of climb to the summit on any route from a higher peak, or from sea level if there is no higher peak. The lowest point on that route is the col.
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Also, topographic prominence for an island is from sea level, rather than from the ocean floor where the mountain actually begins. That arbitrary cutoff makes the Hawaiian islands seem much smaller than their height above average terrain.
What made this important enough to post? (Score:1)
Why do you post such trifling crap? You know that's what it is so please explain to Slashdotters your specific motivation for a steady flow of low-quality tabloid-tier posts.
Why should anyone care what two bureaucracies consider the height of an object when that's absolutely useless information?
Why do you think it important to post that instead of USEFUL tech info?
You will not stop and obviously cannot be fired or competent leadership would have, but you can certainly explain to readers your reasons for mak
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But since you asked, here is a little more useful background on the subject: NPR Shortwave [npr.org]
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"Why do you post such trifling crap?"
But they zoomed over the internets, so it's news for nerds, stuff that matters nowadays.
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speaking of USEFUL (Score:2)
maybe you could submit a story and check the firehose instead of posting an off-topic rant.
I Can Sleep Tonight (Score:2)
snow height? (Score:3, Insightful)
Great, so ever winter I need to amend my building plan with the county to account for foot of snow on my roof?
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"I don't know. Is the snow on your roof a permanent fixture that never melts?"
Yes, it's fake snow, he's Santa.
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never is a long time. even 10,000 year old glaciers melt.
Still Just A Hill (Score:2)
How many dead people are still on the hill?
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Re: Still Just A Hill (Score:5, Funny)
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Every corpse on Mt. Everest was once a motivated person....inspirational QOTD.
No, China and Nepal did NOT agree on a new measure (Score:2)
Re: No, China and Nepal did NOT agree on a new mea (Score:3)
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let's not allow readers to assume the world measures in FEET. We don't.
Unless you're flying [aerosavvy.com], where much of Asia seems to be the exception, and apparently Russia is moving towards feet not away.
What's next? (Score:2)
The Difference (Score:2)
On the other hand, like most dick-measuring contests, one really has to wonder if the difference has any meaning at all.
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On the one hand, I'm always a fan of more precise measurement techniques. The technology of surveying - past and present - is pretty interesting.
I agree, but in that's not the case here. It's a matter of China measuring to the height of the highest point that is composed of rock. Nepal is measuring to the highest point of the snow on top of the rock.
On the other hand, like most dick-measuring contests, one really has to wonder if the difference has any meaning at all.
That's also not the case here. It's not like one country is trying to claim to have the taller mountain. It's simply a matter of what each country believes is the correct way to measure the height of the same mountain.
Feet? (Score:2, Informative)
Yes, TFA uses feet, but doesn't /. have, you know, editors, whose job is, you know, to edit?
From Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:
On 9 October 2005, after several months of measurement and calculation, the Chinese Academy of Sciences and State Bureau of Surveying and Mapping announced the height of Everest as 8,844.43 m (29,017.16 ft) with accuracy of ±0.21 m (8.3 in), claiming it was the most accurate and precise measurement to date. This height is based on the highest point of rock and not the snow and ice covering it. The Chinese team measured a snow-ice depth of 3.5 m (11 ft), which is in agreement with a net elevation of 8,848 m (29,029 ft). An argument arose between China and Nepal as to whether the official height should be the rock height (8,844 m, China) or the snow height (8,848 m, Nepal). In 2010, both sides agreed that the height of Everest is 8,848 m, and Nepal recognises China's claim that the rock height of Everest is 8,844 m.
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I wouldn't be surprised... (Score:4, Funny)
if they committed to a new measurement standard. "It is exactly 1 Everest unit of measurement high."
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The precise technical answer to this is: Many.
Watch the language! (Score:3, Insightful)
China is also a foreigner to Tibet!
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White people are foreigners to America.
I know you are simply exhibiting a knee-jerk reaction to excuse the appalling behaviour of China, but just in case you have some critical thinking ability and are open to improve your worldview, consider this:
1. Pointing out past wrongs of others does not make your present wrongs right, it only shows you can't use your brain. This is very apparent as tu quoque, a failure of simple logic as unreasonable as arguing that 1+1=11.
2. Any reasonably educated American will admit that white people are indeed foreign
Sea level (Score:1)
Doesnâ(TM)t the mountain get taller in low tide?
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Casus Belli (Score:2)
This is just as good a reason as any for Nepal to finally initiate a war with China. In fact it's slightly better than saying they have WMDs or something.
1855! (Score:4, Insightful)
Can we stop talking about China and Nepal for a moment and reflect on the fact that in 1855 they got the height correct to roughly 0.04% over a distance of 29km!!!!
That's pretty damn impressive given that not even sea level is exact to 20ft across the planet.
Re: 1855! (Score:2)
You mean 29kft. Also, their result came out at 29,000ft but they changed it to 29,002ft because it sounded more precise.
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Err yes, sorry I got my Kilometers with Kilofreedoms confused.
Much ado abnout nothing (Score:1)
The Great Trigonometrical Survey (Score:3, Informative)
Measuring the mountain was a small part of a gigantic project to survey Britain's South Asia colony "to have a complete geographical knowledge of the country for their revenue and administrative purposes,” and it took decades. The project involved hundreds of surveyors and support staff, both British and Indian, not to mention elephants, horses, and even camels. The mountain's namesake, Sir George Everest, spearheaded the survey from 1823 to 1843.
There is much in print and online about this. A couple of good places to start are Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] and this article [archive.org] in BlueSci, a Cambridge Univ. science magazine. And for a more complete account, see John Keay's book [amazon.com] The Great Arc: The Dramatic Tale of How India was Mapped and Everest was Named
Until the sea levels rise (Score:3)
They're going to have to change it again once the ice caps melt and the sea level rises.
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It was an altitude adjustment (Score:2)
It made their whole outlook brand new!
Oops! (Score:1)
Oops!
https://www.8848altitude.com/ [8848altitude.com]
Feet? How quaint (Score:1)
International Units? (Score:3)
China uses the International System of Units [wikipedia.org] as far as I know. Well, I'm pretty sure in fact, since I traveled several times there.
Free Nepal! This is the SAME country, not 2 diff (Score:1)
China invaded Nepal and took it by force.
This is China agreeing with China, not 2 different countries talking with each other.
This is propaganda from China.
Free Nepal!
Silly question about measuring the height (Score:2)
My stupid question is wouldn't GPS be a lot faster and simpler instead of survey team and all that?
I admit I'm definitely ignorant on the details though. Was just curious.