Every human on Earth vanishes, except for one random person in the US. A button is placed on the summit of Mount Everest that can be pressed to undo this change. Can humanity be restored?

[u/ThePriestofVaranasi]

Every human on Earth vanishes without a trace, except for one random survivor: Ethan from the United States. Moments after the disappearance, a mysterious device materializes before him, displaying a message:
"Humanity can be restored. To activate revival, you must press the button housed at the highest point on Earth—the summit of Mount Everest."

Ethan essentially has as much of a prep time as he wants to gather all the essentials like food, water, weapons, vehicles and everything else that has been suddenly abandoned. He can raid supermarkets, libraries, military depots, and pharmacies for supplies. Ethan can still die of old age so this prep time isn't unlimited.

Now, Ethan faces an impossible gauntlet:
He must travel to Nepal and ascend to the summit of Mount Everest without dying.

Can Ethan survive long enough to reach the button and restore humanity?

[u/pj1843]

That's not the main issue really. You can go raid the local library to figure a lot of that out and get real good at reading user manuals.

The real issues arise when you realize your on a time limit because the fuel everywhere will degrade quite and will begin to ruin stuff.

Then once you get on the boat and start your journey your going to realize that there is no one to communicate weather patterns to you, so unless you picked a yacht with a Doppler radar your sailing blind and likely could just get dead in a squal or major storm.

Basically there is a lot that can and will go wrong with this without the infrastructure in place to support you.

[u/toolatealreadyfapped → u/pj1843]

All the books in the world can't replace months and years of experience that are typically required for a solo transoceanic trip. So yeah, you're on a time crunch, with A LOT more to do and learn and train and plan for than time allows.

And that's just to get to Nepal! We haven't even approached the issue of what to do once there. When is the last time, if EVER, someone handled a base to summit solo expedition?

[u/Throbbie-Williams → u/toolatealreadyfapped]

You can do Africa to Europe in under 9 miles of sailing

North America to Russia in 2.5 miles.

Edit: with both of those examples you also don't have to have any navigation skills at all, you can see your destination at all times if you leave in daylight

Unless you start in Australia/new Zealand or on tiny islands like Vanuatu almost anyone would be able to cope with the sailing!

[u/CrabAppleBapple → u/pj1843]

You can go raid the local library to figure a lot of that out and get real good at reading user manuals.

Your local library has a book on trans Atlantic/Pacific solo voyages, extensive sea charts, extensive overland maps, extensive reading on how to prepare for that, how to prepare for a solo climb of Mt Everest. Books on mountain climbing to the skill level required to climb Mt. Everest? Books on the right meteorological conditions for your sea voyage? For the climb?

Anyone in the thread saying anything other than 'No, best bet is to hole up somewhere nice to wait out the rest of your days and leave the planet to all the other animals', is deluded.

[u/pj1843 → u/CrabAppleBapple]

Yeah, there is a very good chance your local library has all those things. Libraries be dope AF like that. That being said you are right, the humans best bet is to find a nice comfy house and do their best to live a nice comfortable apocalypse.

Honestly though if they actually wanted to achieve the goal, their best bet is to try and launch an ICBM at everest and hope to hit the button with a missile. Not sure that possible, but definitely a higher likelihood than trying to solo cross the Atlantic then scale everest alone with no training or real prep.

[u/CrabAppleBapple → u/pj1843]

Honestly though if they actually wanted to achieve the goal, their best bet is to try and launch an ICBM at everest and hope to hit the button with a missile. Not sure that possible, but definitely a higher likelihood than trying to solo cross the Atlantic then scale everest alone with no training or real prep.

Absolutely impossible I'm afraid. Even if they happen to work in a missile silo, it takes dozens of people to maintain, prepare for launch, target etc etc etc

[u/RocketDog2001 → u/pj1843]

How long could you be the last person on earth before you start getting visits from the Hatman?

[u/Throbbie-Williams → u/CrabAppleBapple]

From Almost anywhere on earth that isn't australia/new Zealand you can get to Nepal with very little sailing.

2.5 miles if you start in North america, sub 9 miles from Africa, you can see your destination at all times so don't even need to think about navigation!

The only real challenge is ascending Everest, even this is easier than usual as he doesn't actually need to survive after pressing the button.

It's not a challenge I'd like to do but it's far from as insane as it sounds.

The mountain is the only real challenge