Mount Everest, the Reconnaissance, 1921Howard-Bury, Charles
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Mount Everest, the Reconnaissance, 1921
Howard-Bury, Charles
Everest, Mount (China and Nepal); Mount Everest Expedition (1921)
if the snow is found in good condition, and always offering a detour by
which to avoid an obstacle.
From the North-east Shoulder to the summit of the mountain the way is
not so smooth. The rise is only 1,000 feet in a distance of half a mile,
but the first part of the crest is distinctly jagged by several towers
and the last part is steep. Much will depend upon the possibility of
escaping from the crest to avoid the obstacles and of regaining it
easily. The South-east side (left going up) is terribly steep, and it
will almost certainly be out of the question to traverse there. But the
sloping snow-covered ledges on the North-west may serve very well; the
difficulty about them is their tendency to be horizontal in direction
and to diverge from the arete where it slopes upwards, so that a party
which had followed one in preference to the crest might find themselves
cut off by a cliff running across the face above them. But one way or
another I think it should be possible with the help of such ledges to
reach the final obstacle. The summit itself is like the thin end of a
wedge thrust up from the mass in which it is embedded. The edge of it,
with the highest point at the far end, can only be reached from the
North-east by climbing a steep blunt edge of snow. The height of this
final obstacle must be fully 200 feet. Mr. Bullock and I examined it
often through our field-glasses, and though it did not appear
insuperable, whatever our point of view, it never looked anything but
steep.
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Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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