KATHMANDU: A Nepali Army (NA) team of Mountain Cleaning Campaign (MCC) 2021 Everest area has used a helicopter to bring garbage accumulated at Camp II to Base Camp on Sunday.
Major Aditya Karki, a liaison officer of the MCC 2021 at the Everest region, said the cleaning team had to use a helicopter due to unfavorable weather at Everest, resulting from cyclones in the Indian Ocean. ”We did bring all garbage to the Base Camp from above, but on Saturday we could not do so easily. Therefore, we opted for air transport,” said Karki, who is also an Everest climber. He added, ”However, we will not use air transport to ferry the garbage collected at the base camp.”
The NA handed a chunk of biodegradable waste to Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee on Monday morning. Karki himself handed over 418 kilograms of garbage. The remaining 300 kilograms is also in the pipeline, said Karki.
”All remaining non-biodegradable garbage would be ferried to Kathmandu and would be handed over to the organizations working in the environment sector,” said Karki, adding, ”This would happen on the occasion of World Environment Day on June 5.”
Karki said 12.6 tons of garbage was collected from Everest, Lhotse and Pumori mountains. Of this volume, 9.5 tons was collected above Base Camps of the mountains.
This is the third Everest cleaning campaign launched at the initiation of the Nepali Army. The first and second were held in 2011 and 2019 when garbage of four tons and 10 tons were collected respectively.
However, this year, the NA expanded its mountain cleaning campaigns to include other mountains such as Lhotse, Makalu, Dhaulagiri, Pumori and Ama Dablam.
The “Mountain Cleaning Campaign-2021” formally commenced by handing over the banner to the campaign leaders at a special ceremony organized at Nepali Army Headquarters, Bhadrakali, on April 13, 2021.
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