NEW ZEALAND: Edmund Hillary, the first man to climb Mount Everest, has blamed the commercialisation of climbing the world's highest mountain for the death of a British climber.
New Zealand's Hillary, who conquered the summit in May 1953 with Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, said he would have abandoned his own summit bid if another climber's life had been in danger.
"I think the whole attitude towards climbing Mount Everest has become rather horrifying," the New Zealand Herald newspaper quoted him as saying.
"The people just want to get to the top. They don't give a damn for anybody else who may be in distress."
British climber David Sharp died on the mountain last week, apparently after reaching the summit and getting into difficulty on the way down, while several parties - including that of New Zealand's Mark Inglis who became the first double amputee to reach the 8,850-metre peak - passed him by.
"On my expedition there was no way you would have left a man under a rock to die," said Hillary.
"It simply would not have happened. If you have someone who is in great need and you are still strong and energetic, then you have a duty really to give all you can to get the man down and getting to the summit becomes secondary." There have been nine deaths this year on Everest according to mountaineering website www.everestnews.com.
In 2005, a record 101 expeditions tackled Everest, while the 2006 season will see 82 teams attempting to climb the mountain.
Inglis told New Zealand television earlier that about 40 people had passed Sharp on their way to the summit, while his party was the only one that stopped to check on him. "On that morning, over 40 people went past this young Briton. I radioed and [ expedition manager] Russ said: 'Mate you can't do anything. He's been there X number of hours without oxygen, he's effectively dead'. So we carried on," he said. - (Reuters)