How big-spending climbers have turned Mount Everest into a disgusting eyesore

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Mount Everest has become the world's highest rubbish dump with increasing numbers of big-spending climbers turning it into a 'disgusting eyesore', experts claim.

Fluorescent tents, climbing equipment, empty gas canisters and even human excrement litter the well-trodden route to the summit of the 29,029ft (8,848-metre) peak after being dumped by people paying little attention to the environment.

As the number of climbers on the mountain has soared - at least 600 people have scaled the world's highest peak so far this year alone - the problem has worsened.

Meanwhile, melting glaciers caused by global warming are exposing trash that has accumulated on the mountain since Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay made the first successful summit 65 years ago.

Five years ago Nepal implemented a $4,000 (£3,000) rubbish deposit per team that would be refunded if each climber brought down at least eight kilograms (18 pounds) of waste. On the Tibet side of the Himalayan mountain, they are required to bring down the same amount and are fined $100 (£75) per kilogram if they don't.

In 2017 climbers in Nepal brought down nearly 25 tonnes of trash and 15 tonnes of human waste - the equivalent of three double-decker buses - according to the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee (SPCC). This season even more was carried down but this is just a fraction of the rubbish dumped each year, with only half of climbers lugging down the required amounts, the SPCC says.