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Conquering Mount Everest: Climbers do their best despite danger, difficulties and ill fortune

Climbing Mount Everest has been associated with vast ambition, great tragedies – and occasional perfidy.

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Since the first attempt on Mount Everest was made a century ago, more than 310 people have perished along its slopes.

Since the first attempt on Mount Everest was made a century ago, more than 310 people have perished along its slopes.

PHOTO: AFP

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Why would someone living in equatorial warmth want to travel not just to the cold and forbidding roof of the world, but to its very bone-chilling top?

A place where treacherous ice, swirling winds, steep gradients and air so thin that each breath is a work of labour, make existence a torture?

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