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More than 500 people have conquered Mt. Everest in this year's main climbing season, setting a record, a top mountaineering official said.

"This figure will only go up because still there are climbers on the mountain who have not finished their expedition yet," Ang Tshering Sherpa, president of Nepal Mountaineering Assn. told Reuters on May 31. By then, 514 people had made the trek.

It was the biggest number of climbers since Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay first climbed the world's highest mountain in 1953. The previous record was 470 people in the spring climbing season of 2006.

Most climbers who attempt Everest do so in the spring season before the monsoon rains arrive, usually by July. Only a few dozen people attempt to climb outside that season.

Sherpa said his figures were based on the information from teams supported by his Asian Trekking Agency and contacts with the Lhasa-based China Tibet Mountaineering Assn. Tourism Ministry official Khadananda Dhakal said it was too early for the government to compile the total numbers.

About 2,000 people, including a 71-year-old Japanese man, a climber with an artificial leg and a teenage boy, have reached the summit since 1953.

Historians say that many people have conquered the summit more than once, meaning that the number of ascents is likely much higher than 2,000. At least 202 people have died trying to reach the top.