Altitude Illnesses
One category of safety problems specific to mountaineering relates to the consequences of the high altitude itself. With the increasing altitude comes the decline in oxygen availability (hypoxia).
As climbers ascend, the density of the atmosphere becomes less, because the total number of oxygen molecules is less, and the decline in oxygen is roughly proportional to the decrease in barometric pressure and increase in altitude. At 18,000 feet, the barometric pressure is about half that at sea level, and the number of oxygen molecules per liter of air is halved as well.
This decline in the amount of oxygen has several physiological effects.
Some will be life threatening. You can find a detailed description o f the physiological consequences of hypoxia in High Altitude and Physiology (Ward, Milledge, and West 1995).
Three such altitude illnesses will be discussed:
- Acute Mountain Sickness (AMS)
- High-Altitude Pulmonary Edema (HAPE)
- High-Altitude Cerebral Edema (HACE)
(Dougherty, Neil J. IV. Mountaineering Safety. Outdoor Recreation Safety.
