Mount Everest just got a smidge taller after China and Nepal finally agree on height
Mount Everest got a smidge taller Tuesday when China and Nepal agreed on the height of the world's tallest peak.
The two countries had long had different measurements on how tall the mountain that sits on their border really is. On Tuesday, the two governments announced the new official height: 8,848.86 meters, about 29,032 feet.
That's taller than what China and Nepal both had down for Everest's height. Nepal had said the mountain was 8,848 meters, about 29,029 feet, while China didn't count the snow cap and placed it at 8,844.43 meters, about 29,017 feet.
With shifting tectonic plates, Everest's height has always been a slow-moving target. Some had worried that the mountain actually shrank after a 2015 earthquake, which killed around 9,000 people, including at least 19 at Everest base camp.
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Both countries sent surveyors, Nepal in 2019 and China in 2020, who agreed on the height. Their measurements were made official Tuesday when the countries' foreign ministers, Wang Yi of China and Pradeep Gyawali of Nepal, pressed buttons at the same time during a news conference to reveal what each side had calculated.
“This is a milestone in mountaineering history which will finally end the debate over the height and now the world will have one number,” said Santa Bir Lama, president of the Nepal Mountaineering Association.
Lukas Furtenbach, who founded the expedition company Furtenbach Adventures, told USA TODAY in an email that the change doesn't mean as much for climbers as changes in temperature on Everest triggered by climate change.
Still, "it’s good to see that China and Nepal have worked together in recent measuring using the latest technology that gives us the most precise measurement," he said.
How many measurements have there been?
China and Nepal's measurements weren't the only ones floating around. The first Everest surveys came in the mid-19th Century from Indian mathematician Radhanath Sikdar, who was measuring what was then called Peak XV. A few years later, Britain's Sir Andrew Scott Waugh, who named the peak Mount Everest, said it stood 29,002 feet.
Many accepted a 1954 measurement from the Survey of India as Everest's official height: About 29,029 feet. In 1999, National Geographic's surveyors used GPS technology to determine Everest was 29,035 feet.
The 2019 survey by Nepal relied on GPS and other satellite equipment to determine the peak's height and snow's depth.
According to the BBC, Nepal used the Bay of Bengal as Everest's base and then worked to create points along a 155-mile stretch, all the way up to the summit, which could be used to calculate the mountain's height.
"The project was a matter of national pride for Nepal and a prestigious undertaking for the Nepali government. I feel very proud that we were able to complete it successfully," Susheel Dangol, deputy director general at Nepal's Department of Survey, told CNN.
According to the BBC, Nepal's lead surveyor, Khimlal Gautam, lost his toe due to frostbite as the team climbed the mountain.
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China's team of surveyors used the Yellow Sea as their base and scaled the peak as the mountain was closed to other climbers in 2020 to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
Chinese President Xi Jinping, who visited Nepal in 2019 and agreed to send a team from his country to determine the height, said the agreement will establish an "even closer community of a shared future to enrich the countries and their peoples."
Contributing: The Associated Press
Follow USA TODAY's Ryan Miller on Twitter @RyanW_Miller
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mount Everest: China, Nepal agree on how tall it is after long dispute
