Mount Everest is Earth's highest point: 29,028 feet at the summit. It is a brutal place where temperatures at -50F are common; where fingers, toes and noses can quickly freeze solid, and where there is only one-third of breathable oxygen available as there is at sea level; where the cold and hypoxia can lead to madness, coma and death. It takes months to acclimate your body to attempt the climb, and it can cost tens of thousands of dollars to hire the right guides to help you survive a summit attempt. But despite the danger and the hardship, climbers flock to Everest from around the world, determined for whatever reason to reach "the roof of the world."

In 2006, Mount Everest claimed the lives of eleven people, the highest number of on-mountain fatalities since 1996: three Sherpas, Tuk Bahadur (a Sherpa kitchen boy), Vitor Negrete (Brazil), Tomas Olsson (Sweden), Sri Kishan (India), Jacques-Hughes Letrange (France), Thomas Weber (Germany), Igor Plyushkin (Russia), and David Sharp (England). A twelfth, Australian Lincoln Hall, was left for dead but managed to survive overnight at 28,200 feet with no shelter or food.

Some of these deaths were immediately recognized as accidents — falls, or people succumbing to pulmonary or cerebral edema. Others were viewed more suspiciously: some other climbers near Thomas Weber at the time of his death believed that his guide took too long to respond to Weber's distress; later investigations suggested that Weber may have climbed Everest as a means to commit suicide.

The saddest story was that of David Sharp: a solo climber, not affiliated with any of the big outfitters and purposely attempting the ascent without oxygen, Sharp died alongside the trail as reportedly forty other climbers trudged past him on their way to the top. While the rest of the world erupted in outrage that no one rescued Sharp, the reaction of most high altitude climbers was that it was all most of the other climbers could do to keep from dying themselves, much less drag another sick climber down to safety.