Aside from the direct dangers posed by hyperthermia and hypothermia, Hackett’s study suggests that the temperature fluctuations that occur within the bodies of climbers place enormous physiological stresses on the body as it struggles mightily to return itself to the state of thermal homeostasis on which it depends for survival. This additional stress, added to all the other stresses of climbing—the thin air, the extreme exertion, the unrelenting need for concentration, the glare of the sun, the threat of frostbite, and so on—is sometimes what pushes climbers’ bodies over the edge, into a kind
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