Baker Perry climbing Mount Everest equipped with high-altitude gear. Photo Cred: Dawa Yangzum Sherpa / National Geographic
Sofia Carmichael, Staff Writer to The Powderhorn
Baker Perry, a climatologist and a published researcher, co-led the most comprehensive scientific expedition to Mount Everest and starred in a National Geographic documentary. Receiving worldwide recognition for his work, he has seen many of the world’s natural wonders, but something has always called him back to the mountains.
A passion for weather and climate has always been a part of Baker Perry’s life. Growing up in Maine, he was fascinated by the harsh winters, and while living in Bolivia, South America, and North Carolina, high elevations piqued his interest.
“My parents tell me that I was just totally captivated as a small kid by the extreme weather, " said Perry. “We moved to Bolivia and lived at 13,000 feet, and would take family outings up to as high as 17,000 feet, and so that really gave me an appreciation for the role of mountains, and especially snow and ice serving as water towers and sustaining communities and ecosystems downstream.”
While Perry always had a passion for climatology, it wasn't until he witnessed the effects of climate change on mountainous terrain that his journey to Mount Everest began.
“I began taking students to Bolivia while I was at Appalachian State, and we started to see just how quickly things were changing, and especially how quickly glaciers were disappearing and shrinking”, said Perry. “I began to understand that this was having a big impact already on water resources, and that this was going to be a huge issue looking down the road into the future.”
Perry was soon offered a leadership position on a research team headed to Mount Everest to study the effects of climate change at the highest elevation in the world.
“Our task was to establish a network of weather stations from the lower Sherpa community of Phortse and all the way up to just below the summit,” said Perry.“There were 4 other teams that were part of our expedition, one biology team. We had a geology team. We had a glaciology team focused on ice coring. And then there was also a mapping team that used drones and helicopters to do surveys on the ground to do mapping.”
Perry and his team spent a lot of time preparing their equipment for installation. They carefully considered what sensors to include, how to attach them, what data to measure, how to connect the stations to satellites, and ensured everything worked properly.
“This was the most intense group project I have ever been a part of,” said Perry. “We had so much planning ahead of time. We had to test everything. That happened here in the United States, that happened in Kathmandu before we packed things up and moved them up to the mountain. That happened at Base Camp and it happened for the higher stations even at Camp 2.”
A trek to the summit of Mount Everest is tremendously harsh on the body and mind. To prepare, Perry averaged 15-20 hours per week focusing on fitness training, both in the gym and on the local terrain.
“I spent a lot of time on trails going up and down in the North Carolina mountains,” said Perry. “Howard’s Knob was one of my favorite places to train on my bicycle. I would ride up and down. One day I did 12 laps up and down Howard’s Knob so that was, you know, 12,000 vertical feet right there.”
Perry and the other members of his team took months to make sure they were ready for the difficult journey ahead, but an unexpected obstacle of illness took its toll on the group.
“The biggest difficulty is that we all got sick with upper respiratory infections. The challenge is that altitude, and with it being that cold it's very difficult for your body to recover and for your immune system to fight,” said Baker. “It makes it that much harder to sleep at night. Your airway is irritated, and so cumulatively, that takes a toll, and it certainly did. So none of us were 100%. And that slowed us down quite a bit.”
The global effects of climate change are becoming increasingly evident. For example, Hurricane Helene had an unprecedented impact on the North Carolina mountains.
“What sets Helene apart is how quickly it tracked inland, and the fact that there was so much rain out ahead of it that it had saturated everything,” Perry explained. “So it was able to maintain some more of its strength farther inland. From a wind perspective, it was really catastrophic damage. The storm track was just perfect to allow the strongest winds to intersect with the Blue Ridge escarpment. We had so much wind driving, so much moisture, and then being forced upward by the mountains to just maximize the precipitation efficiency.”
After the intense flooding and devastation caused by Helene, the concentrated studies on climate effects at higher elevations are becoming even more critical.
“I was a co-author on the North Carolina Climate Science Report about 5 years ago,” said Perry. “In that report we highlighted the potential for increased flooding and storm impacts from hurricanes as we look to the future.”
Following his successful mission to Everest, Perry is choosing to put his focus on helping closer to home.
“Now that I'm here in Nevada as a State climatologist, I am trying to expand observational networks in the state,” said Perry. “Here we have huge gaps in the observational weather network. I'm starting to work with partners here to identify opportunities to enhance existing stations and expand the network, especially in the mountains and higher up."
Beyond his great advancements in his field, Perry is also a professor who inspires students to follow their passions and explore how they can help the world.
“Find something that you're passionate about, and pursue opportunities to learn, to act, to make a difference,” said Perry.
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