Day Twenty: Nanda Devi

Over the summer I created over 35 achievement badges for the Withings Health Mate fitness app.

Day twenty is Nanda Devi in the Himalayas!

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“Nanda Devi is the second highest mountain in India and the highest entirely within the country. Its name means Bliss-Giving Goddess. The peak is regarded as the patron-goddess of the Uttarakhand Himalaya. In acknowledgment of its religious significance and for the protection of the its fragile ecosystem, the peak as well as the circle of high mountains surrounding it—the Nanda Devi sanctuary—were closed to both locals and climbers in 1983. The surrounding Nanda Devi National Park was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1988.

Attempts were made from 1965 to 1968 by the CIA, in co-operation with the Indian Intelligence Bureau, to place a nuclear-powered telemetry relay listening on the summit of Nanda Devi. The device was designed to intercept telemetry signals from Chinese missile test launches in Xinjiang Province, in the period of relative infancy of the Chinese missile program. As a result of this activity, the Sanctuary was closed to climbing by foreign expeditions during much of the 1960s, and was not re-opened until 1974.”

(From Wikipedia)