Mobile video calling possible from Qomolangma base camp

Mountaineers can now make video calls with their mobile phones from the 5,200-meter-high Mount Qomolangma base camp, which has been covered by the 3G network.

A just-finished week-long trial of the No. 2 China Mobile 3G base station at the camp has found it to be working well, providing a stable network service, according to a statement issued on Friday by the mobile operator's Tibetan branch.

Zhuo Feng, general manager with the branch, told media that signal from the base station can reach a height of 6,500 meters.

"Tourists were complaining that they could not make phone calls at the base camp," he said. "Now they can call their friends here and show them the picturesque landscape of Mount Qomolangma."

Statistics from the government of Dingri County, which lies at the foot of the mountain, showed that 67,000 tourists, including 15,000 from abroad, visited the base camp last year.

Zhuo said the company does not have any plans to move the base station to a higher altitude for the time being, in consideration of pressure from environmentalists.

He said mobile network has covered 90 percent of the areas along the route linking Lhasa, capital of southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, and the base camp.

The camp is often used as a resting place for climbers preparing for ascents or descents of the 8,848-meter-high Mount Qomolangma.