None of Mount Everest’s four base camps, which are located at 17,380 feet, have proper facilities. The camps have tents, equipment, supplies and even cooks, but no toilets. The waste is collected in a drum in a toilet tent, where it is then carried to a lower altitude and disposed.

But not all climbers use the camps’ facilities to do their business.

“Climbers usually dig holes in the snow for their toilet use and leave the human waste there,” Tshering told The Associated Press, adding that waste around the base camps has been accumulating for years.

Away from the base camp, as climbers head toward the 29,035 foot summit, human waste is also an issue.

“It is a health hazard and the issue needs to be addressed,” said Dawa Steven Sherpa, who has been at the forefront of Everest cleanup expeditions since 2008. Some climbers carry disposable toilet bags with them to the higher camps that don’t have any facilities, Sherpa said.

Last year the Nepalese government imposed new rules, which requires climbers to return to the base camp with 17.6 pounds of waste. The weight is an estimate of the average amount of trash climbers accumulate en route.

The government does not currently have plans to deal with the human waste issue

The government does not currently have plans to deal with the human waste issue, however Puspa Raj Katuwal, the head of the government’s Mountaineering Department, said officials will strictly monitor it, adding that climbing teams must submit a $4,000 deposit that they will lose if regulations are broken.

Human fecal waste and trash isn’t the only thing left on the mountainside. According to an article released in 2012 by Smithsonian Magazine, more than 200 human bodies remain frozen on the mountain. Some of them are even used as landmarks.

More than 4,000 climbers have braved the mountain since its first expedition in 1953.