Carlos Rubio was evacuated from Everest. Photo: Alex Txikon 
 
 A Spanish climber who was part of a team attempting to summit Mount Everest in winter has been evacuated from the mountain, expedition organisers said on Monday. 
 
 Carlos Rubio, 28, and compatriot Alex Txikon, 35, have been on Everest since early January attempting the first winter summit of the world's highest peak without supplemental oxygen in nearly three decades. 
 
 The pair were at camp two -- 6,400 metres (20,997 feet) above sea level -- when Rubio was crippled by altitude sickness and evacuated by helicopter from the mountain on Friday. 
 
 He was flown to Kathmandu on Saturday and is now recovering in hospital, Tashi Sherpa of Seven Summits Trek, the agency managing the expedition, told AFP. 
 
 "He was evacuated from camp two because of effects of altitude sickness," Sherpa said. 
 
 
 
 Carlos Rubio was evacuated from Everest. Photo: Alex Txikon 
 
 Txikon remains on Everest and has now reached camp three (7,200 metres). He said in a Facebook post that he would ascend to camp four -- the last one before the summit -- on Monday. 
 
 "I could practically not walk. I was very, very, very, very weak. The head was motivated but the body demanded it. I came down and now I am recovering," 
 
 Rubio said from hospital in a YouTube video posted Sunday. 
 
 "We were 10 minutes out of camp two when it hit me," Rubio told AFP from avhospital bed in Kathmandu. 
 
 "It was very bad luck. It was my first time on a mountain that's over 8,000 metres. It was an ambitious project." 
 
 The last successful winter summit of Everest was in 1993 by a Japanese team. But no one has reached the peak without using supplemental oxygen since a Nepali mountaineer in December 1987. 
 
 Mountaineering experts say climbing in winter is more dangerous than spring -- when most people tackle the 8,848 metre peak -- owing to high winds and extreme cold. 
 
 Temperatures at the summit average -36 celsius (-33 fahrenheit) in winter and can drop as low as -60 celsius. 
 
 The team -- which includes four Nepali guides -- had experienced winds of over 100 kilometres (62 miles) per hour and windchill temperatures of minus 40 C (minus 40 F), Rubio said. 
 
 Txikon is expected to try and reach the summit -- where temperatures average minus 36 C in winter and can drop as low as minus 60 C -- in the first week of February. 
 
 Rubio said he expected to be discharged from hospital later Monday and would fly home to Spain in the next few days. 
 
 Mountaineering is a major revenue earner for impoverished Nepal, home to eight of the world's 14 peaks over 8,000 metres. ||||| Mount Everest officially stands at 8,848 metres (29,029 feet) above sea level Scientists will take the tape measure to Mount Everest to determine whether a massive earthquake in Nepal really did knock an inch off the world's tallest peak. 
 
 India's top surveyor said Tuesday a team of scientists would be sent to neighbouring Nepal to measure Everest in the hope of putting to rest a debate about the true height of the towering mountain. 
 
 A deadly 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck Nepal in 2015, killing thousands and altering the landscape across the Himalayan nation. 
 
 Satellite data at the time suggested the impact of the quake reduced Everest's peak—which officially stands at 8,848 metres (29,029 feet) above sea level—by anywhere between a few millimetres and an inch. 
 
 But lingering doubt among the scientific community has prompted a fresh expedition to size up the peak, said India's surveyor general Swarna Subba Rao. 
 
 "We will remeasure it," Rao was quoted as saying by the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency, adding the team would set off in two months. 
 
 "Two years have passed since the major Nepal earthquake and there's doubt in the scientific community that it did in fact shrink." 
 
 The exercise will require a month for observation and roughly another fortnight for the data to be officially declared. 
 
 Another official told AFP that a five-member team would depart for the expedition at winter's end, and would take measurements using instruments on the ground to gauge the peak's real height. 
 
 The earthquake, Nepal's deadliest disaster in more than 80 years, is also believed to have shifted the earth beneath the capital Kathmandu several metres to the south. 
 
 Explore further: Mount Everest shifted southwest due to Nepal earthquake ||||| HYDERABAD: The height of Mount Everest will soon be "re-measured" by the Survey of India to determine whether the world's tallest peak has really shrunk following a devastating earthquake in Nepal two years ago.An expedition from the Survey of India would depart for Nepal in two months to conduct the exercise that comes in the backdrop of doubts expressed by section of the scientific community about the shrinking of the towering mountain peak. Mount Everest officially stands at 8,848 metres (29,028 feet) above sea level.The project, for which required sanctions have been obtained, would help the future scientific studies as well, Surveyor General of India Swarna Subba Rao said here today."We are sending an expedition to Mount Everest. Everest's height was declared, if I remember correctly, in 1855. Many others also measured it. But the height given by Survey of India, even today, is taken as the correct height. It is 29,028 ft," he said."We are re-measuring it. It is almost two years since the major Nepal earthquake . After that, there is a doubt in the scientific community that it is shrinking. That is one of the reasons. Second reason is, it helps in scientific studies, plate movements etc," he said.All the necessary approvals have been obtained for the expedition and the effort should begin in a month, he said on the sidelines of a meeting of the Geospatial World Forum."I have got all the approvals. MEA ( Ministry of External Affairs ) also done. If the Surveyor General of Nepal has come here (for the conference in Hyderabad), I will have a meeting with him. As I see it, we plan to send (the expedition team) in two months," he said.The endeavour would take about a month for observation and another 15 days for computation and declaration of data, Rao added.Rao told PTI the height of Mount Everest is planned to be measured this time by two methods-- using Global Positioning System(GPS) and a ground method."There are two methods. One is GPS. It is a survey instrument. It looks like a transistor. If you put it on the summit, say for 10 minutes, it tells you the height. That is one."The Second is, ground method. Triangulation. We observe. The height can be calculated from ground," he added.Rao said the measurement is being done by the two methods for better confirmation of the findings."We are doing at the same time by both methods for better confirmation," he added.A deadly 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck Nepal in 2015, killing thousands of people and altering the landscape across the Himalayan nation. ||||| Image copyright AFP Image caption Some scientists believe that Mount Everest shrank as a result of the 2015 Nepal earthquake 
 
 The Indian government has said it plans to measure the height of Mount Everest for a second time to assess whether it changed as a result of the 2015 Nepal earthquake. 
 
 Surveyor-General Swarna Subba Rao said an expedition would be sent to the world's highest mountain in two months. 
 
 Nepalese officials, however, told the BBC that no agreement had been reached on allowing an Indian team access. 
 
 Satellite data has indicated the quake impact reduced the height of the peak. 
 
 The most widely recognised height, 8,848m (29,028ft), came from an Indian survey 62 years ago. 
 
 Scientists have said that the height of a swathe of the Himalayas dropped by around one metre shortly after the 7.8 magnitude Nepal earthquake. 
 
 Satellites dissect Nepal quake 
 
 Himalayan 'drop after Nepal quake' 
 
 They added at the time that a ground survey and GPS or an airborne mission would be needed to determine whether the world's highest peak had seen a change in its height by a few centimetres. 
 
 Mr Rao told the BBC that India's central mapping agency, the Survey of India, would "work with the government of Nepal, which has agreed in principle to collaborate" with the measuring efforts. 
 
 But Ganesh Bhatta, Nepal's survey department deputy chief, later told the BBC that there was no agreement with India, adding that Nepal was in fact planning its own survey. 
 
 A combination of GPS measurement and triangulation is required to measure the exact height of the mountain. 
 
 Mr Rao said it was still unclear whether the earthquake had affected Everest's height. 
 
 "We don't know what happened, there's been no confirmed report," he said. "Some scientists do believe it has shrunk. But there's a school of thought it may have grown." 
 
 He told the Press Trust of India news agency that a 30-strong team would take about a month to make its observations and another 15 days to compute and declare its data.
– Call it the mystery of the missing inch. India's surveyor general on Tuesday announced that the country would "remeasure" Mount Everest to determine whether the 7.8-magnitude earthquake that devastated Nepal in April 2015 really did shave a bit off the mountain's height. The AFP reports that satellite data indicated as much as an inch was lost from the 29,029-foot behemoth, but "there's doubt in the scientific community that it did in fact shrink," explains Swarna Subba Rao. The BBC reports it'll be the second such measurement India has made: The current height was determined in a survey the country conducted 62 years ago. Rao says a team will depart for Nepal in two months, and he tells the Press Trust of India they will use two methods of measurement "for better confirmation": GPS and a ground method, "triangulation." A month will be spent observing, with the determination being made official about two weeks later. In other Everest news, one man's dream of being the first since 1987 to summit the peak in the winter without supplemental oxygen has seen it dashed. The Local reports Spaniard Carlos Rubio was airlifted off the mountain Friday after experiencing altitude sickness. Companion Alex Txikon has made it to camp 3; there is one more before the summit, where temperatures average -33 degrees Fahrenheit in winter. (Everest experienced its second deadliest day ever because of the quake.)