Mt Everest's famous Hillary Step has collapsed, according to mountaineers.
Named after New Zealand's Sir Edmund Hillary who, climbing with Sherpa Tenzing Norgay, was the first person to conquer Everest, the "Hillary Step'' was a 12-metre high rock barrier on the South-East Ridge which is known as the final major hurdle before reaching the peak.
However, it appears the Hillary Step is now gone following Nepal's 2015 earthquake.
"It's official - The Hillary Step is no more,'' Everest Expedition said on its Facebook page.
"Not sure what's going to happen when the snow ridge doesn't form because there's some huge blocks randomly perched hither and thither which will be quite tricky to negotiate.''
The collapse was initially reported in 2016, however climbers weren't certain the Hillary Step was gone because the area was blasted with fresh snow.
However, further confirmation of The Step collapse came from Pemchhiri Sherpa, who told planetmountain.com
"Yes, it has changed ... before we had to climb the rock but now, after the earthquake, the route has changed and now we need to climb from the right.''
British mountaineer and expedition leader Tim Mosedale confirmed the news, saying the step had been destroyed, leaving "rubble and debris''.
"It's easier going up the snow slope (and indeed for inexperienced climbers and mountaineers there's less `climbing' to be done making it much easier for them). However it's going to form a bottleneck.
"The Hillary Step often formed a bottleneck but some years they fixed an up and a down rope,'' he said.
"In the current state it would be difficult to safely negotiate down where the step used to be on account of the huge unstable rocks that are perched on the route.''
