Singapore biker Vaune Phan set off for Mt Everest today morning at 5pm on a solo bike trip that will span a month and bring her through Malaysia, Thailand, Laos, China and Tibet before reaching the Everest base camp.
Media reported that 27 year-old Phan will undertake the 8,000km journey to help raise awareness and funds for the Singapore Disability Sports Council and disabled athletes.
“Since becoming a rider, I have realised that life is very vulnerable. I know of people who got into accidents and became disabled,” Ms Phan told media.
Along the way, she expects to be assisted by Singapore’s embassies in each country and have to escorted by a tour guide in China.
She will also be meeting staff members from her sponsors in the motoring industry stationed in Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur as she passes through.
Ms Phan made the news in February 2014 when she posted an image in protest of rising Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) costs for motorcyclists.
The image depicted a woman riding a horse through an ERP gantry, to which Phan ranting on the rising transport cost that is squeezing motorists at every turn, before concluding, “So, shall we start commuting around on animals, like horses, since it is the year of the Horse too?”
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In other news, Mt Everest might be facing an ecological downturn, not to mention lose its picturesque qualities, as its glaciers are predicted to be gone by 2100.
A new study estimated that 70-99% of the glaciers in the Everest region in Nepal could melt with the continued rise of the planet’s temperature.
The team heading the study used computer models of predicted change in the climate to assess the pattern of snowfall and seasonal melt in the mountainous region of the world’s highest peaks.
“Our results indicate that these glaciers may be highly sensitive to changes in temperature and that increases in precipitation are not enough to offset the increased melt,” said Dr Joseph Shea, a glacial hydrologist at the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development in Kathmandu who heads the study team.
