SEVEN MOUNTAINEERS FEARED DEAD AFTER STORM ON MOUNT EVEREST.

Byline: Christopher S. Wren The New York Times

As many as seven mountain climbers may have died high on the exposed ice and rock of Mount Everest's north face over the weekend, according to incomplete but ominous accounts emerging from places as far afield as Russia, Kazakstan, Nepal and New Zealand.

The casualties include three Russian mountaineers, two of whom vanished in a storm after arriving on the 29,028-foot summit perilously late in the afternoon.

The other climbers who are believed dead include a German, a South Korean and a Nepalese. The nationality of the seventh climber has yet to be established. It appears that the dead climbers were from at least three separate expeditions, according to the reports.

The accidents came a year after Everest took the lives of eight other climbers, including two Americans, who climbed the south flank of the world's highest mountain.

The deaths last year of two experienced mountain guides, Scott Fischer of the United States and Rob Hall of New Zealand, were attributed to their attempts to save clients who had hired them to ascend Everest. That disaster touched off an angry debate in mountaineering circles about whether Everest had become a trap for adventurous amateurs, people with little or no climbing experience who pay up to $65,000 for the thrill of being hauled up the world's best-known mountain.

Since last spring's Everest climbing season there has been talk of imposing minimum standards for prospective Everest climbers. But no action has been taken.

The latest fatalities, however, are different, in that all but one appear to have been experienced climbers. They died not on the easiest route, but on the more challenging, even more isolated Tibetan side of Everest, at a time when the monsoon season increases the risk of storms. It is rare for climbers to survive storms at such heights without prepared shelter.