'Heavy lifter' drones could soon solve Mount Everest's trash problem

• Sherpas will soon use drones to remove trash from Mount Everest's slopes.
• Everest's peak has become a massive garbage dump with 50 metric tons of waste annually.

Mount Everest looks more like a landfill every year as crowds of adventurous climbers flock to its slopes.

Visitors have left an estimated 50 metric tons of waste on Everest. The mountain is so full of garbage that people have called it "the world's highest garbage dump."

Nepal has tried all kinds of solutions, including a mandate that climbers collect and carry out 18 pounds of garbage every time they visit or pay a fee of thousands of dollars.

It has mostly, however, fallen on the literal shoulders of the Sherpa people, who live in the high mountainous regions of the Himalayas. Sherpa guides who help climbers navigate the mountains also gather trash and supplies left behind.

But the sheer volume of garbage is so overwhelming that carrying it out has proven difficult — and dangerous.

Cue the giant flying garbage robots.

Nepal plans to deploy unmanned "heavy lifter" drones that sound like a "swarm of bees" to remove the trash, The Kathmandu Post reported.

These high-altitude drones could also help lay rope lines and prepare routes for climbers, reducing their reliance on Sherpas and possibly reducing injuries and deaths.

The drones were developed and manufactured by Chinese drone maker Da Jiang Innovations. DJI also makes consumer drones popular in the United States and has been the target of a proposed ban for national security concerns.

The company delivered its first drone to Everest in April for a test run. A single drone was able to carry 500 pounds of garbage an hour between two camps at Everest's base, a feat that would normally require over a dozen Sherpas and take six hours, according to The Kathmandu Post.

Jagat Bhusal, chief administration officer of the rural municipality that is home to Everest, told the Post that using the drones will help the Sherpas avoid navigating the "dangers in the Khumbu Icefall."

The Khumbu Icefall is a 1.6-mile stretch of slowly cascading ice just above Base Camp on Everest's "South Col" route. The 2024 Everest climbing season was delayed by 12 days in May after rising temperatures caused the glacier ice to crumble. Just last year, an avalanche on the Khumbu killed three Sherpas.

"Going up there one part of the day and coming down the next day could look very different, and the probability of that getting worse with a warmer climate increases," Paul Mayewski, a Mount Everest researcher at the University of Maine, previously told BI.

Bhusal said that Sherpas will be trained to operate the drones so that eventually "all the work will be done by Sherpas," he told the Post.

"Yes, there are concerns that the machines may actually cut jobs. But our sole purpose is to reduce potential deaths in the Khumbu Icefall, the danger zone," Bhusal said.