The BBC reported a famous feature of Mount Everest has collapsed, making the world’s highest peak more dangerous to climbers. Mountaineers said the Hillary Step may have fallen after Nepal’s 2015 earthquake. The almost vertical 12m rocky outcrop stood on the mountain’s southeast ridge, and was the last challenge before the summit.

It was named after Sir Edmund Hillary, the famous New Zealand mountaineer and explorer who was the first to scale it in 1953. British mountaineer Tim Mosedale said the Step had collapsed after reaching the summit on 16 May this year. he said the loss of the Step was “the end of an era”. “It is associated with the history of Everest, and it is a great shame a piece of mountaineering folklore has disappeared,” Mosedale said. Mountaineers claim the snow-covered slope will be much easier to climb than the rock-face.