Color vision deficiency a dead end for mountaineering career, as an athlete?
Is having color vision deficiency a problem for mountaineering ? Can one so, pursue mountaineering as a career ? Do professional mountaineering schools and expeditions accept climbers with color vision problem for high altitude (7000ers or 8000ers) climbing, as sponsored athletes ? To clarify, as per the free online tests underwent as of now, it is moderate-to-strong Proton color vision defect, Red color blindness (Protonopia). Also my sibling is having it (genetic).
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It depends on the nature of the deficiency. The most common form, red-green colorblindness, isn't a problem: I'm not aware of any situation where color coding is used to convey safety-critical information. On the other hand, if you've got rod monochromacy, climbing mountains is probably a bad idea.
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I don't know whether e.g. mountain guides for expeditions are accepted if they have color vision deficiency. But as a participant I don't think this is a no-go criteria. There were guys with asthma and other serious medical limitations going on 8000+ and Mark Inglis made it on the Everest with two artificial legs.
I don't know what you suppose of a mountaineering career though. Do you want to become a sponsored mountaineer? If so, it's up to you which risks you want to take and with higher risks the chances to get publicity (and sponsorship) increases.
Again, I think if you are going to be physically and mentally prepared, have a growing experience base in mountaineering and the background knowledge, you are going to have better chances to reach a high summit than some rich tourists which are just trying to brag with their achievement.
This post was sourced from https://outdoors.stackexchange.com/a/5522. It is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.
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