According to this FB post, the Hillary Step is gone:

https://www.facebook.com/34365556908532 ... =3&theater

The snow conditions in the 2 photos are drastically different. There is obviously much more snow in the photo from this year than the photo to which it's being compared.

I remember being surprised at the Hillary Step during my 2001 climb. So different than so many of the photos I'd seen. We were entirely on snow just to the left of the ridge crest to one exposed bit of rock, a chest high mantle onto a flat topped boulder, then back onto snow til the summit. I only have the one trip and the quoted climbers have a lot more experience with the area but still... There are other photos that show a slight change in some of the rock but show the larger rock features still in place, just holding a lot more snow.

JimS

I read somewhere that Mt. Everest is growing and in a few million years will be in the stratosphere. That would pretty much mean no oxygenless climbs. I guess what happened to Hillary Step goes into the database of how fast it's crumbling.