The earthquake that has devastated Nepal and left thousands dead moved the earth below Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal, up to several meters south of the area. Has this affected the height of Mount Everest? A team of experts from the University of Cambridge (United Kingdom) have explained that no; the height of Mount Everest remains the same, it has been maintained.
Nepal is home to the highest mountain range on the planet and in it is the main summit of the Earth, Mount Everest, with a height of 8,848 meters .
The 7.9 magnitude earthquake has been the deadliest Himalayan disaster in more than 80 years and the first seismological data obtained from sound waves traveling through the earth after an earthquake indicate that the ground under the capital Kathmandu it has moved three meters to the south because of the natural event. However, at the moment it is not clear if these changes are large enough to require adjustments to the world’s highest precision maps.
Regarding Everest, experts believe that, at most, the difference will represent only a few millimeters : “The main slide of the plate was west of Everest and the mountain was not directly above the plane of the fault”, clarifies Sandy Steacy of the University of Adelaide (Australia). And it is that three meters in a horizontal direction does not mean much in a vertical direction , the experts clarify.
We will soon know if there has been any detectable change in the real height of the highest mountain in the world since they are currently investigating in satellite snapshots before and after the event.
