Just How Deadly Are The 8000 Meter Peaks?

Each year, about this time, there is a lot of talk in the media about how dangerous it is to climb Everest and to a lesser extend the other 8000 meter peaks. Typically we're coming of another spring climbing season in the Himalaya and the non-climbing public is shocked to hear that 8 or 10 people have died on Everest. It makes good headlines for the mainstream media that is looking to drum up traffic, even if the stories ignore the fact that hundreds of people successfully summit.

With that in mind, yesterday The Economist published an infographic that compares each of the 14 8000-meter peaks in terms of the number of successful summits vs the number of deaths. You can find that graphic below and I think it speaks quite clearly for itself.

Some of the numbers are surprising and some are sobering, particularly when you look at K2 and Annapurna.