Beyond the Second Step – Hypotheses & Considerations

Table of Contents
Introduction June 5, 1924 June 6, 1924 June 7, 1924 – Comments on Mallory’s note to Noel – Comments on Mallory’s note to Odell – Some notes on the oxygen question – Some notes on Mallory’s equipment list – The sleeping bag issue	June 8, 1924 – Mallory & Irvine’s ascent to 8500 m/28,000 ft. – Mallory & Irvine’s ascent beyond 8500 m/28,000 ft. – Climbing the Second Step – Is the Mystery finally solved? Beyond the Second Step – Hypotheses & Considerations Where is Andrew Irvine? Conclusions Expedition Waste

Mallory’s Watch

In 1999 British climber-cameraman Jim Curran offered the following hypothesis with regard to Mallory’s watch:

“In 40 years of climbing I only damaged two or three watches – all in the same manner: in wide jamming cracks, when I had forgotten to take them off. The Second Step was free-climbed (sic!) by Conrad Anker with a knee-bar and a hard jam …”

This hypothesis was later expanded by author Charles Lind in his novel, An Afterclap of Fate (p. 108):

“When Mallory’s body was discovered, his watch was found inside his pocket. It was minus its crystal and also the minute hand was broken off and missing. Quite obviously it had been taken off and put there after it had been damaged. No traces of glass were found in his pocket. Mallory wore his watch on his left arm and facing inwards. The damage to the watch fits perfectly what would have happened if he had forgotten to take it off and attempted an arm jamming and levering climb. … And consider the fact that the watch has been carefully taken off and put away in his pocket. The watchstrap was thin and the buckle small, this was an operation requiring the removal of warm, outer gloves and the use of bare fingers. And it requires that at the time he did it, he was still in a sufficiently alert and well-functioning mental state to care enough to be bothered to do this and had the time. … You wouldn’t be fiddling about with your watch in a snowstorm [which engulfed the upper mountain between 2 and 4 pm; JH’s note] and after 4 pm, exhausted and with every minute of remaining daylight so vitally precious … This reinforces the argument in favour of the watch having been damaged whilst doing the crack climb of the Second Step.”

Based on a photograph taken in 1999 at Camp 5, which showed the now missing remnants of the hour hand, and what I took to be the broken-off stumps of the hands, I believed the watch had stopped at 12.52 or 12.53 (see Mallory’s watch, © Rick Reanier/Jochen Hemmleb) – just about the time when Odell saw Mallory and Irvine climbing what he always believed had been the Second Step. Yet watch experts have now conclusively disproved that stumps were parts of the hands. Therefore the only clues pointing to the time when the watch stopped are the rust stains on the watch’s face. As the position of the hour hand is known (see above), they point to the watch having stopped at 1.27 – which would be in accordance with the approximate time of a rest stop above the Second Step, as postulated by Lind.

One last bottle?

If Mallory & Irvine had indeed successfully overcome the Second Step at 1 p.m., their second pair of oxygen bottles would now have been finished. Mallory’s notes on an envelope (see 3.3) strongly suggest that he and Irvine had set off for the summit with a total of five (5) bottles of oxygen. At the time of a (hypothetical) rest stop on the plateau above the Second Step, both climbers would now have been left with one (1) full bottle of oxygen.

A surplus sleeping bag?

Australian Everest researcher Phil Summers has pointed out that Mallory’s equipment list for the summit attempt (see 3.3) lists, among other items, 2 “sahib bag + mattress” and “1 coolie bag”. Why, if C 5 and C 6 had already been equipped with bedding? One sahib bag (and mattress) might have been used to replace Norton’s sleeping bag at C 6, which had become wet from a leaking thermos. Yet the purpose of the additional coolie bag is unclear. However, it should be noted in this context that the Chinese climber Xu Jing, who almost certainly found the body of Andrew Irvine high on the Northeast Ridge in 1960, repeatedly stated that the body had been in a sleeping bag – even though it is generally assumed that Mallory & Irvine would not have taken a (emergency?) sleeping bag on their climb for weight reasons. At 6 lbs. the weight of a coolie bag would have been less than that of a full oxygen bottle (8 lbs.)

The storm

A recent study of the weather situation in 1924 (Moore, K.G.W. et al., “Mallory and Irvine on Mount Everest: Did extreme weather play a role in their disappearance?”, Weather, vol 65, 8, August 2010) and interviews conducted with Austrian meteorologist, Karl “Charly” Gabl, for the documentary Erster auf dem Everest demonstrated that Mallory & Irvine were climbing into an approaching trough of low barometric pressure during their summit bid on June 8, 1924.

Mallory and Irvine would have been sheltered from the wind during the initial part of their ascent while the trough approached from the SW, but would have been fully exposed when the wind turned direction with the passing of the trough. Besides worsening climbing conditions (increased wind, precipitation, drop in temperature), the trough also led to a significant drop in barometric pressure, which would have compounded Mallory & Irvine’s hypoxic state after their oxygen supply had run out.

In another interview, renowned high-altitude physiologist, Prof. Dr. Oswald Oelz, graphically described the effects:

„Wenn man bis in eine gewisse Höhe mit Sauerstoff geklettert ist und dann ist der Sauerstoff aus, dann ist das Ende Feuer. Dann kommt man nicht mehr weiter – When you have climbed to a certain altitude with oxygen and it runs out, then it’s ‚end of fire’. You just can’t go on.“