3 Nepalese Sherpas buried alive in avalanche on Mt Everest

Three Nepalese Sherpa guides went missing on Wednesday after they fell into a deep crevasse on the most dangerous section of Mt Everest amidst an avalanche, in the season's first accident at the world's tallest peak.

The incident occurred between Camp 1 and the base camp of Mt Everest when the Sherpa guides were carrying expedition logistics, Nepal officials said. 

A team of around 25 high-altitude guides were climbing above the Khumbu Icefall early Wednesday when a massive ice sheet of more than 50 metres tumbled down the mountain, below Camp 1 at 5,700 metres, burying the three Sherpa guides underneath, The Kathmandu Post newspaper reported.

The missing Sherpas were identified as Themwa Tenzing Sherpa, Lakpa Rita Sherpa and Badure Sherpa.

The possibility of finding the missing climbers alive is ”very slim”, the Everest base camp coordinator of the Himalayan Rescue Association, Lakpa Norbu Sherpa, was quoted as saying in the report.

”They are buried five to six metres underneath," Sherpa said, adding that launching a search mission was not possible due to the risk of further avalanches.

”It's not that they fell into crevasses. They are buried under the ice masses in the Khumbu Icefall, the most dangerous section of Everest,” he added.

According to the report, Bigyan Koirala, an official at the department of tourism, said rescue efforts are on, and a chopper made three rounds in the area.

Koirala said that rescuers would use devices like the Recco detector and avalanche transceiver to search and locate people buried under snow.

According to the report, the Khumbu Icefall, a river of ice a kilometre or so, is normally crossed during the night or early morning with climbers using headlamps and even experienced Sherpas hesitate to move when the sun shines.

The icefall stretches from 5,500 metres to 5,800 metres and lies just above the Everest base camp.

A powerful 7.8-magnitude earthquake triggered an avalanche on Mt Everest in April 2015, killing 22 people, the deadliest incident on the mountain on record.

On April 18, 2014, an avalanche buried 16 sherpa guides in the Khumbu Icefall and led to the cancellation of the season's expeditions.

It added that 13 bodies were recovered within two days, while the remaining three were never recovered.