This actually is quite serious. For example, I love to climb mountains and have done this all my life. But, at age 17 I found I couldn't sleep at 9000 or 10,000 feet on San Gorgonio. I started throwing up and had to run while throwing up down to around 8000 feet where I finally recovered myself. So, this is true of many people. Especially if you still have your tonsils you have less breathing space to push air in an out than if they are gone. However, if you remove your tonsils this messes some people's hormones up for life too. So, it is a catch 22 situation for many people.
The way I dealt with this was to only climb during the day time above 8000 feet in elevation. So, this often meant leaving at between midnight and 2 am in the morning so I could return to 8000 feet or lower before the sun went down on climbs. Because once you learn you can't sleep above 8000 or 9000 feet to continue to try to do this could kill you by accident. However, at age 37 I was able to sleep at around 9000 feet or higher because I had been hiking for a week already in higher altitudes of the Himalayas then in 1986 a total of about 50 miles. There were no roads at all there then just trails and long suspension foot bridges across rivers and canyons. The monsoons and steep mountains prevent roads being built. I suppose you could make tunnels and bridges but the locals believe the mountains are sacred there and likely wouldn't allow that to happen either.
begin quote from:
Eleven
Army Special Forces soldiers were successfully evacuated by helicopter
from the summit of Longs Peak in Colorado today after two of them
suffered altitude sickness, extending a one-day …
Helicopter Evacuation Launched for 11 Green Berets on Colorado Peak
KMGH
Eleven Army Special Forces soldiers were successfully evacuated by
helicopter from the summit of Longs Peak in Colorado today after two of
them suffered altitude sickness, extending a one-day mountain exercise
into a two-day affair, military officials said.
The 11 Green Berets, who belong to the 10th Special Forces Group based
at Fort Carson, Colorado, were conducting a mountain training exercise
Thursday at Longs Peak that was only supposed to last the day, according
to Lt. Col. Sean Ryan, a spokesman for the 10th Special Forces Group,
But two of the soldiers got altitude sickness and the rest of the group
decided to stay on the 14,000-foot mountain overnight to tend to their
colleagues, Ryan said.
On Thursday night, the elite group of soldiers informed rangers at Rocky
Mountain National Park of their whereabouts and their intent to remain
overnight on the snow-covered mountain.
"Late last night, Rocky Mountain National Park
staff were notified that a group of ten people were requesting
assistance on Kiener’s Route on Longs Peak," said Kyle Patterson, a
spokesperson for the park. It was unclear why park officials said 10
people while military officials said 11 people.
"A few members reported having some degree of distress and were having
difficulty continuing up the route," Patterson said. "The group
continues to self-rescue by assisting each other to climb to the summit
of Longs Peak."
The soldiers determined it would be easier to proceed to the mountain's
summit rather than to climb down to a lower elevation, Ryan said.
Altitude sickness can be a factor in mountain training, he said, even
for highly-trained and fit special operations forces like the Green
Berets.
Forty-three park personnel were involved in helping to resolve the incident, Patterson said.
A helicopter made repeated trips to the snow-covered summit to evacuate all of the soldiers.
Ryan stressed that none of the soldiers was missing as had been indicated in early social media descriptions of the incident.
“No one is lost, missing or injured,” Ryan said.
Mark Pita, the chief ranger at Rocky Mountain National Park, later
described the soldiers as being tired, hungry and thirsty after their
adventure.
The helicopter evacuation was not characterized as a rescue because the
soldiers made it to the top of the mountain under their own power.
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