Everest 2005: Mallory and Irvine The Final Chapter: Q&A Autumn 2005 Part 2

Q&A Autumn 2005 Part 2

©EverestNews.com

Hello from Canada and keep up the great work in unraveling the M&I mystery. I look forward to your updates every day and have the following four questions for you:

Q. EverestNews.com reader: Where does the normal route up the north ridge gain the ridge after the 2nd step?

A. EverestNews.com: Well that depends on how to define the "ridge". But after you go up the Second Step (as it is defined by climbers today), you come out on top and go parallel to ridge and then up the Summit Pyramid and then up an area you can see in the top picture. See below for a couple of pictures.

Stu Peacock's Everest video had much footage that would help many of you understand more about this whole area above high camp. Everest: In the Footsteps of Legends DVD-R NTSC VERSION and VHS Version

Q. EverestNews.com reader question continued: If Mallory goes up the true 2nd step and stays on the ridge above the pyramid snowfield there could be plenty of places to leave oxygen bottles, racks, etc. that have not examined climbers. Thanks for all your hard work.

A. EverestNews.com: There is a ton of space up high that is virgin ground. Today's climbers stay on the route put in by the Sherpas. Few go before the Sherpas, and even then the old ropes show the way. Mallory did not have "the Yellow brick road". While the way after the Second Step (on the ridge or the face) is very logical, Mallory could have varied from where the climbers go today. If one assumes he had enough oxygen to get to the Summit, which no one knows if he did or did not have enough, then one would presume the oxygen racks and bottles would of been left on the way down.

Where is Mallory's Oxygen rack? Is a 64 million dollar question!

Q. EverestNews.com reader: A question that will help me visualize the route that Mallory may have taken - according to your theory - to overcome the second step: Referring to the photo that shows the steps from the true ridge, does your theory have Mallory going to the left (East) to get around the top of the second step, or to the right (West)?

A. EverestNews.com: Our Theory has George staying on the Ridge.

On that note, we have now had time to study the film from 2005 and we agree with our climbers: "it is very possible to go that way staying on the ridge". YES!

Part 3 soon: (Sorry for the delay, it is always way too busy here...)

We returned to Mount Everest in search of an answer.

Dispatches

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