SINGAPORE — A pair of Singaporean parents recently came under fire for their decision to take their four-year-old son on a hike to the Everest Base Camp in Nepal. Civil servants Rakcent Wong, 35, and Carol Tan, 36, are
Photos showing Mr Rakcent Wong, his wife Carol Tan and their son Atlas Wong trekking to the base camp of Mount Everest in Nepal in May 2024.
However, they called off the hike just six hours shy of the base camp, after Atlas developed symptoms of acute mountain sickness and his oxygen saturation dropped to “worrying levels”, he said. The mountain, at 8,850m tall, is the highest among those in Himalaya. From space, it is considered the highest point on Earth.In a May 19 post for the “Engaging Atlas” Instagram account, the family said that they were heading to the Everest Base Camp after cancelling a trip to Jordan due to “rising tension” in the country.Mr Wong told TODAY that while they were in Turkey researching their next destination, Nepal “popped up” as an option.
“We tried to mimic the typical day on a trek. That’s about eight hours of trekking a day, 8km to 12km walk with an elevation gain of about 500m. We hiked almost daily for about a week.” After their week of “informal training” in Turkey, the family rested in Cyprus for five days before flying to Nepal.Acute mountain sickness was “definitely a concern” for them, so they consistently tracked their oxygen saturation levels, which would give a “good indication” of whether they were hit by altitude sickness, Mr Wong said.
They also ensured that they stopped for hydration every half an hour and took a longer break at every hourly mark. The boy had stopped vomiting and having diarrhoea, but the couple did not want to “push too much”, and so had the porter carry him, Mr Wong said. They could not get an accurate reading on their device, but Atlas’ oxygen saturation level was fluctuating between 44 and 70 per cent.
Worried that there would be further complications if they were to spend the night at that altitude, the couple hired two horses to take the family 300m down the mountain. The trio rested in the village for the night, before taking a helicopter ride down to Lukla and Kathmandu the next morning.Mr Wong noted the online criticism that they have received, but said that with the hindsight of what had transpired during the trek, they would have still taken their son to attempt the trek.“The journey to the Everest Base Camp is not easy but not too tough either. It teaches persistence and the importance of maintaining a determined mindset to navigate obstacles.
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