Rainbow Valley: The Open-Air Cemetery on Mount Everest's Northeast Ridge

Rainbow Valley gets its name from the colours of the dead.

Above 8,000 metres on Everest's northeast ridge, the slope below the summit is scattered with the bright down jackets, sleeping bags, and equipment of climbers who died there and could not be retrieved. Green. Red. Yellow. Orange. Seen from below, the colours stand out against the rock and snow. The name was not given by geographers. It was not on maps. Climbers described what they saw.

That description has become an informal name for one of the most concentrated areas of human remains on Earth.

Where Rainbow Valley Is

Rainbow Valley sits on Everest's northeast ridge, accessible from the Tibetan side of the mountain. The slope begins above approximately 8,000 metres and extends toward the summit, which stands at 8,849 metres. It is not a valley in any topographic sense. It is an open, exposed face with no shelter, no natural containment, and no way to retrieve anything from it without the same resources required to climb the mountain itself.

The northeast ridge is the route used by expeditions approaching from Tibet through China. It is less trafficked than the south col route from Nepal, which means fewer rescue attempts are possible when climbers get into difficulty on the north side. Bodies on this route accumulate in conditions where even fewer witnesses are present.

Why the Name

The jackets are the reason. In the death zone, climbers wear the most insulated, brightly coloured gear made. The colours serve a practical purpose: visibility in whiteout conditions, identification by rescue teams. In Rainbow Valley, the colours remain long after the function is gone.

When climbers die above 8,000 metres and cannot be retrieved, the mountain preserves them in freezing temperatures. The clothing does not fade as it would at lower altitudes. The jackets remain vivid. The sleeping bags still catch light. The gear that was meant to keep someone alive becomes the marker that they did not make it.

The name is informal. No official body has ever recognised "Rainbow Valley" as a geographic designation. But the image it describes is precise enough that climbers who have never visited the northeast ridge know what it means.

The Bodies That Are Still There

Hannelore Schmatz became the fourth woman to summit Everest on October 1, 1979. She was descending the northeast ridge when darkness fell. She and an American climber named Ray Genet bivouacked at 8,300 metres. The Sherpas with the expedition urged them to keep moving. Both Schmatz and Genet died during the night.

For five years after her death, Schmatz remained visible on the slope, sitting against her pack at approximately 8,300 metres. Her eyes were open. Her hair moved in the wind. Summit teams passed and reported her. She was a landmark. Climbers used her position as a navigational reference.

She was the first Western woman to die on Everest and the first to be left on the mountain. She was 39.

Green Boots, the informal name given to a climber widely believed to be Tsewang Paljor, an Indian mountaineer from the 1996 Indian-Tibetan Border Police expedition, died in a limestone overhang on the northeast ridge. The overhang became known as Green Boots Cave, named for his visible green boots. Other climbers rested there. The cave was a waypoint on the route to the summit.

David Sharp died in the same cave in May 2006. He had summited. He was descending. More than forty climbers passed him on their way up or back down. He was alive when the first climbers arrived. He died there. The ethical question of passing a dying climber on Everest was not new before Sharp. His death made it impossible to avoid.

The Cost of Recovery

In October 1984, Nepal sent a police expedition to recover Hannelore Schmatz's body. Five years of pressure from her family and the German government had produced a response.

Inspector Yogendra Bahadur Thapa and guide Ang Dorjee reached 8,400 metres. At that altitude, on that terrain, carrying a frozen body down was not simply a physical problem. It was an impossible one. Both men fell to their deaths during the attempt.

Two Nepali men died trying to bring one German woman home.

Schmatz's body eventually disappeared, believed swept away by wind and shifting snow. The mountain resolved the situation the mountain's way. But the names of the two Nepali men who fell trying to retrieve her are not in most articles about Rainbow Valley. The foreign dead are mourned in international press. The Nepali dead who died trying to bring them home are a footnote.

This cost is not historical. It is structural. Every recovery attempt in the death zone carries the same arithmetic: the risk of death for the living, for the sake of the dead.

What Passing Through Looks Like

Every climber on the northeast ridge who approaches the summit passes through Rainbow Valley. There is no route around it.

Chad Gaston, who summited Everest recently and spoke to CBS News about the experience, described passing incapacitated climbers on the ascent. He described one man "wrapped like a mummy." The bodies and the dying become navigational markers, reference points in the cognitive fog of the death zone.

This is the ethical dimension that no amount of gear or preparation resolves. At 8,500 metres, with limited oxygen and a closing weather window, the decision to stop and attempt rescue is not straightforward. Stopping can mean dying. The climbers who passed David Sharp were not all indifferent. Some were themselves near the edge of what they could survive.

The northeast ridge is less crowded than the south col route, which changes the calculation further. Fewer climbers present means fewer potential rescuers. It also means the bodies are more isolated. More permanent.

What Is Being Done Now

Nepal's 2024 cleanup programme, covered by the BBC, was the first formal government-led retrieval effort on Everest. It targeted the south col, on the Nepali side of the mountain. Bodies retrieved during the programme were brought to base camp and, where identification was possible, returned to families.

Rainbow Valley is not on the south col. The northeast ridge falls under the access and jurisdiction of China, not Nepal. The 2024 programme, which made headlines across international media, did not reach the bodies in Rainbow Valley. The cleanup that was described as historic did not touch the slope that most people associate with Everest's dead.

The bodies there remain under a different set of rules, a different government's priorities, and at an altitude where removal requires resources that no programme has yet committed.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Rainbow Valley on Mount Everest?

Rainbow Valley is an informal name for the slope on Everest's northeast ridge above 8,000 metres. It gets its name from the brightly coloured jackets and equipment of climbers who died there and could not be retrieved. The name is not an official geographic designation.

Why is it called Rainbow Valley?

The name describes what climbers see: a slope scattered with the vivid colours of down jackets and sleeping bags belonging to those who died there. The extreme cold preserves both the climbers and their gear. The colours remain visible against rock and snow.

How many bodies are in Rainbow Valley?

More than 100 climbers are believed to have died on Everest's northeast ridge in the area known as Rainbow Valley. The northeast ridge's Tibetan approach limits access for official counts or recovery operations.

Who are the famous climbers in Rainbow Valley?

Hannelore Schmatz, who died in 1979 and remained visible on the slope for five years, is one of the most documented. Green Boots, believed to be Tsewang Paljor from the 1996 ITBP expedition, died in a limestone cave on the route that has since carried his name.

Can you see Rainbow Valley when climbing Everest?

Climbers using the northeast ridge from Tibet pass through it. Those on the south col route from Nepal do not. The majority of commercial Everest expeditions use the south col route, so most climbers do not pass directly through Rainbow Valley.