A group of experts is said to be questioning and re-measuring the height of Mount Everest, a mountain known as the highest mountain in the world.
Mount Everest as the highest mountain in the world has been stuck in everyone's mind as one of the first common knowledge learned. Similarly, Neil Armstrong as the first person to walk on the Moon or the blue whale is the largest animal on the planet. But the question of the height of Mount Everest begins to cross the minds of experts when they see how that height is measured. With a number of different parameters, it is possible that Everest is no longer the highest mountain in the world. These parameters may include measuring the height from the base of the mountain, the height of the mountain from the center of the Earth, and the height from the Plain. Until now, the measurement used is to calculate the peak of the mountain from sea level.
Mount Everest has been measured many times over the past few decades, and the most recent assessment announced in November 2021 places it at 29,031.69 feet, or the equivalent of 8,848.86 meters above sea level. Mount Everest itself is located deep in the Mahālangūr Himāl region of the Himalayas, and is undoubtedly the most controlled mountain of all the mountains on our planet. The mountain is also known as Chomolungma, which means "Mother Goddess of the World" in Tibetan. Everest was first climbed in May 1953 by Tenzing Norgay, a Nepalese Sherpa and Edmund Hillary from New Zealand. Until now, Everest has been successfully climbed by about 4 thousand people. The mountain has also claimed the lives of more than 300 people since records were kept in 1922. Everest's height is impressive, but it also raises the question of why "above sea level" has been used for calculations.
"In order to have comparability in measurements, it is necessary to have a consistent basis," said Martin Price, a professor and founding director of the Center for Mountain Studies at the University of the Highlands and Islands in Scotland.
"Historically, and even now, altitude is usually given as the height above mean sea level," said Price.
"However, this should refer to a standard mean sea level, which has to be determined. Sea levels are different in different parts of the world, and they change due to climate change."
The measurements currently applied relate to the mathematically defined geoid of the Earth. The geoid is a model of the global mean sea level used to measure the exact elevation of the surface. Average values are used to determine the height of the mountain, a process that sometimes requires an airplane to fly back and forth over the mountain in a series of parallel lines. This is done to measure how much gravity is pulled down at the top. These measurements are taken in conjunction with GPS readings, providing very accurate altitude readings. If the measurements were converted to calculations from the base of the mountain, Everest's title would be transferred to Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano in Hawaii. Although its peak is at 13,802 feet or 4,205 meters above sea level, which is less than half the height of Everest, most of Mauna Kea's body is hidden below sea level. When measured from base to peak, Mauna Kea is 33,497 feet or 10,211 meters.
"It all depends on the perspective you take," said Price.
"If there were no oceans on our planet, there would be no debate! You can compare the highest mountains to other bodies in our solar system, which have no oceans," he added.
Besides Mauna Kea, one of Everest's competitors if the parameters are changed is Chimborazo. Chimborazo isn't the highest mountain in the Andes, not even in the top 30, but its proximity to the equator is what makes the difference. Earth is not a perfect sphere, and it protrudes along the equator. This is the result of the force created by the rotation of the earth. As a result, that means there is a difference of 13.29 miles or about 21.39 kilometers between the planet's polar radii and the radii at the equator. Chimborazo is just 1 degree south of the equator, where the Earth's bulge is most pronounced. And this geographical uniqueness means that Chimborazo's peak is 3,967 miles or 6,384 kilometers from the Earth's core, making it 2,072 meters farther from the planet's center than the summit of Everest.
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