Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world. It is located in the Himalayas. It is 8,848 meters above sea level, but it grows taller every year. Every year it grows by about just over 6 millimeters, or a quarter of an inch. Because it is so high, the summit, or top, is covered with deep snow all year long. Mount Everest is also very old. It is thought to be about 60 million years old. In Nepal, Mount Everest is known as Sagarmāthā. This means goddess of the sky. People in Tibet call it Chomolungma. This means mother goddess of the universe.
It is a very difficult and dangerous mountain to climb. The first people to climb to the summit were Sir Edmund Hillary from New Zealand and Tenzig Norgay from Nepal. They reached the top of the mountain on May 29, 1953. They climbed the south side of the mountain. The first people to climb Mount Everest from the north side were Chu Yin-Hau and Wang Fu-zhou from China and Nawang Gombu from Tibet. The youngest person to climb it was Jordan Romero from America. He was only 13 years old when he did it. The oldest person was Miura Yuichiro from Japan. He was 80 years old.