13-Year-Old Is Youngest to Scale Everest

A 13-year-old American boy became the youngest climber to reach the top of Mount Everest today, surpassing the previous record set by a 16-year-old Nepalese. Jordan Romero called his mother by satellite phone from the summit of the world's highest mountain, 29,035 feet above sea level. He is now one climb away from his quest to conquer the highest peaks on all seven continents—only the Vinson Massif in Antarctica remains.

"He says, 'Mom, I'm calling you from the top of the world,'" Leigh Anne Drake said from California, where she had watched her son's progress on a GPS tracker online. "I just told him to get his butt back home." The teenager with long curly hair—who climbed Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa when he was 9—says he was inspired by a painting in his school hallway of the seven continents' highest summits.