Edmund Hillary died on 11 January 2008 in Auckland, aged 88. A New Zealand mountaineer and philanthropist, Hillary worked as a beekeeper before taking up climbing in the Southern Alps and the Himalayas. On 29 May 1953, as part of a British expedition led by John Hunt, he and the Sherpa climber Tenzing Norgay became the first people confirmed to have reached the summit of Mount Everest. He was knighted soon after. He later reached the South Pole overland in 1958 as part of the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition. Through the Himalayan Trust he devoted much of his later life to building schools, clinics and bridges for the Sherpa people of Nepal, and he served as New Zealand's high commissioner to India.
Before and after
- 27 December 2007Death of Benazir Bhutto
- 2008Origins of Kontinental Hockey League
- 2008Rise of The Zeitgeist Movement
- 2008Launch of Encyclopedia of Life
- 11 January 2008Death of Edmund Hillary
- from 20 January 2008 to 29 September 2013Premiere of Breaking Bad
- 27 January 2008Death of Suharto
- 7 February 2008Launch of STS-122
- 17 February 20082008 Kosovo declaration of independence
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The era
This moment belongs to the Contemporary world (1945 CE to today), the world since 1945. You can also browse everything in the 21st century.