China still disagrees on height of Mt. Everest

[parakhi]

http://www.parakhi.com/news/2012/02/20/china-still-disagrees-on-height-of-mt-everest

February 20, 2012 Posted By : parakhi

According to media sources, China is pressuring Nepal to recognize the height of Mt. Everest as 8,844.43m instead of 8,848m, which is the official height of the world’s tallest mountain. The official height cited by Nepal was first ascribed to Everest by Indian surveyors in 1955. The United States Geological Survey (USGS), a scientific agency of the United States government uses 8,850m as the official height of Everest from the measurements in 1999.

The disagreement stems from Nepal government’s acceptance of the measurement of Everest by rock height while China adds snow height. Last year, both countries had initially settled the dispute by accepting the height of Everest to be 8,844m. China had earlier signed the Nepal-China border map in 1975, accepting the height of Everest to be 8,848.13m.

The border talks between Nepal and China, which was scheduled for this month has been postponed after the height of Everest was included as one of the issues. USGS had earlier determined the height of Everest as 8,850m in 1999. While earlier heights were determined by trigonometric and level methods, USGS had used global positioning system (GPS) technology to determine the new height of Everest.

http://www.parakhi.com/news/2012/02/20/china-still-disagrees-on-height-of-mt-everest

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