The summit of Mt. Everest became a wi-fi hot spot when 3G service was successfully launched in Nepal by a Sweden-based carrier. The chief executive of Ncell, a subsidiary of TeliaSonera, said the highest video call ever had been made from the Mount Everest base camp Friday. Now that Nepal has the beginnings of a 3G network, climbers can go online at the summit of the world’s highest peak and one of one of the most backward countries on Earth will get a taste of modern technology.
World’s highest 3G base station
The 3G at Mount Everest will benefit climbers a ton. They had to use satellite phones to talk to anybody while up there before. A series of 3G base stations are being set up by Ncell. It built the highest one at 17,000 feet near Mount Everest in a village called Gorakshep. For climbing adventurers, real time weather reports and emergency communications could be one of the most practical use of Everest 3G. Ncell explained that surfing the web, sending e-mail and making calls could be cheaper than with satellite phones for all of the locals.
Everest communications
3,000 people have made the trip to Mt. Everest and climbed it. This has all been since 1953 when Sir Edmund Hilary first climbed the mountain. The nearest telegraph office would get the messages from climbers back then. That’s because runners had to be used to send messages. Carrying the equipment for a satellite phone weighed you down 220 pounds. This had been how much it weighed when the climber living in Nepal, Veikka Gustafsson, first came to the Humalayas, reports TeliaSonera. Since 2007, the only coverage at Mount Everest in China had been the partial service from China Mobile.
Nepal and 3G
Access to telecommunication services is not common in Nepal. In fact, it is accessed by only one third of the people living there. The jagged mountain makes it really difficult to build cellular towers. Also, building land-based networks is almost impossible. The 3G network had been something Guafsson talked about. He said:
“It’s hard for people in the Western world to even imagine what it means for people living in distant villages in valleys separated by high mountains when they now make their first phone call to relatives or are able to contact a doctor over the phone.”
Ncell has about 3.7 million subscribers in Nepal, a number that will rise now with 3G service. By the end of 2011, TeliaSonera plans on having 90 percent of the human population in Nepal covered by investing $100 million.
Find more info on this subject
BBC News
bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-11651509
Daily Tech
dailytech.com/Worlds Highest AboveWater Peak Everest Gets Internet Access/article20026.htm
PC Magazine
pcmag.com/article2/,2817,2371750,00.asp
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