At least 17 dead, others missing as Nepal quake rocks Mount Everest

 

A powerful magnitude-7.8 earthquake in Nepal sparked a deadly avalanche on Mount Everest on Saturday, killing at least 17 people on the mountain. At least 30 were injured.Among the dead was Google engineer Dan Fredinburg. It was not immediately clear how many of the deaths were located at the base camp, where at least 30 tents were flattened when the avalanche plowed into part of the camp.

 

  The exact number of injured or missing was also unknown.

Base camp is where journalists, climbers and their families gather and get news to the world about developments at Everest, the world's highest mountain above sea level. The disaster comes a little more than a year after another Everest avalanche killed 16 Sherpa guides, the highest death toll ever for an avalanche on the mountain. The guides protested the government's lack of protection for them by refusing to work, canceling the climbing season. Hundreds of climbers make summit attempts on Everest each year. In 2013, 800 climbers reached the summit. Carsten Lillelund Pedersen, a Dane who was climbing the Everest with a Belgian, Jelle Veyt, said on his Facebook page that they were at Khumbu Icefall, a rugged area of collapsed ice and snow close to base camp at 16,500 feet, when the earthquake hit. 

 

He wrote on his Facebook page about one person with the most severe injuries who sustained many fractures. "He was blown away by the avalanche and broke both legs. For the camps closer to where the avalanche hit, our Sherpas believe that a lot of people may have been buried in their tents," he wrote in English. "There is now a steady flow of people fleeing basecamp in hope of more security further down the mountain" Veyt said on his Facebook page that he "ran for my life," and was fine. At least one team of climbers on Everest appears to be safe after a few hours of anguish in which the expedition leader asked for prayers on social media in the wake of the massive quake that killed more than 1,400. After some hours of silence and pleas from followers to post about the group's welfare, expedition leader Dan Mazur finally posted on Facebook at about 8 a.m. ET, "We felt the earthquake on the north side but have no damage and all are safe." Mazur, a team leader for the groups Summit Climb and Summit Trek, based in England and Washington state, was leading a team of 10 up Everest. They were at Camp 1, about 3,000 feet above the base camp, when the quake hit.