Mapping Past Mountaineering Fatalities in the Himalayas

Mountaineering is a popular hobby and every year hundreds of expeditions take place in Nepal. While majority of these expeditions are successful but some climbers face fatal consequences in those tough terrains. All these information have been carefully archives in a unique database called the "The Himalayan Database" by Elizabeth Hawley. The objective of this present map is to visualize this information in form of a webmap and help disperse the rich and informative dataset via free access to the public. It’s important that we realize these past fatalities can help to reduce the number of future fatalities by analyzing data from the past and present in a format that is freely accessible. If those who are interested in taking the treacherous and intense journey to a Himalayan peak, they should be aware of the important facts from past expeditions.

For better communication of a huge volume of data, visualization, especially if it has a strong spatial component, is more effective and cognitively intuitive than looking at a table with numbers (Patterson & Eggleston, 2017; Epstein and Pacini, 2001). When people have the option to get in contact with an interactive figure or graphic, this can result in many benefits. Some examples of these benefits are the organization it offers to the user as well as allowing them to absorb such an elaborate set of data (Alvarado-Pérez, et al., 2015).

Following the trend of databases increasing in size, combining Knowledge Discovery in Database (KDD) with data visualization is almost necessary nowadays. Together, they operate to ease the process of analyzing data, which also eases the viewer’s experience as well. Data visualization assists in defining the meaning of a specific set of data as well as interpreting that dataset so others can comprehend the extent of it (Few, 2007). Through every step of the way, visualization should be considered to assist in the data mining processes, tracking patterns within the data, and most importantly, connecting the dots between the analyst, the domain expert, and the audience of the product (Rezende, et al., 1998). When looking at a visual graphic, naturally, our brain works to interpret it. With that interpretation comes meaning making, which then can lead to “memory recombination”. Meaning making is important to visual interpretation because if people find a significance to some set of data or map, for example, it will increase their ability to remember it (Patterson & Eggleston, 2017). With my visuals, mountaineers can take this information and decisively plan which areas have proven to be most difficult for past mountaineers. Stories from those who have survived the climb are extremely beneficial, but my research will offer the contributions and stories so to speak, of those who weren’t fortunate enough to make it back. This research is significant because it has the ability to serve as a tool for future climbers, given that the number of those interested in the feat is only increasing.


References

Alvarado-Pérez, J. C., Bolaños-Ramírez, H., Peluffo-Ordóñez, D. H., & Murillo, S. (2015). Knowledge discovery in databases from a perspective of intelligent information visualization. IEEE Xplore Digital Library, 1-7.
Epstein, S., & Pacini, R. (2001). The Influence of Visualization on Intuitive and Analytical Information Processing, Imagination, Cognition And Personality, 20(3), 195-216.
Few, S., & Edge, P. (2007). Data visualization: past, present, and future. IBM Cognos Innovation Center, 1-12.
Hawley, E., & Salisbury, R. (2014). The Himalaya Database: The Expedition Archives of Elizabeth Hawley. Golden, Colorado: The American Alpine Club.
Leaflet — an open-source JavaScript library for interactive maps. (2019). Retrieved from https://leafletjs.com/
Patterson, R. E., & Eggleston, R. G. (2017). Intuitive Cognition, Journal of Cognitive Engineering and Decision Making, 11(1), 5–22.
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Salisbury, R., & Hawley, E. (2011). The Himalaya by the Numbers: A Statistical Analysis of Mountaineering in the Nepal Himalaya. Kathmandu, Nepal: Vajra Publications.
Slavsky, B. (2019). How Climate Change is Making Mount Everest More Dangerous. Retrieved from https://www.climbing.com/news/climate-change-on-mount-everest-old-bodies-and-new/