Appendix 2: Chinese Mysteries, Part I: Early proofs of a Second Step ascent in 1960
As I was preparing Appendix 1, I was startled to discover strikingly similar descriptions of the Second Step`s terrain in reports dating back as far as 1960, the year of the claimed first ascent of the North Ridge by the Chinese:
"Before long, we came upon the last technical hitch of the route to the summit, that is the Second Step (8570-8600 m) [...]. It is a sheer and slippery rock wall. After searching around at the bottom of the rock wall, we decided to ascend along a razor-edge ridge hardly a metre wide and then turn to the right to continue the climb up the step. We pressed on with great determination and care, boldly using the necessary mountaineering techniques. At 21.00 hours Peking time we reached the foot of the three-metres-high vertical slab at the top of the Second Step, 8600 m." [1] (emphasis added by author)
Although the account is lacking almost any topographical details, the initial route described here - an approach via the crest of the ridge, followed by a traverse to the right before climbing up the (northern) face of the cliff - is in fact the only way to surmount the Second Step [the OTT deviation joins the original route at the foot of the step]. There is some dispute about the height of the headwall which differs between 3 and 5 metres, depending on source.
Shih Chan-chun and Wang Feng-tung did not manage to climb this final part of the Second Step and were forced into a miserable bivouac in a snow-filled crevice. They had hoped to continue next day, reconnoitring a way to the summit, but exhausted from their previous efforts they decided to retreat. Three weeks later, on 24 May 1960, the summit party, consisting of Wang Fu-chou, Chu Yin-hua, Konbu and Liu Lien-man, left the top camp for their final assault and attempted the Second Step once again:
"The Second Step was even more difficult with a slippery perpendicular surface over 20 metres high. To its north was a climbable chimney about one metre across. But it was filled with broken stones and its exit was blocked by a boulder with an icy surface stretching up to the foot of a 5-metre cliff." [2] (emphasis added by author)
This report, issued more than twenty years after the ascent, contains considerably more details, describing the off-width crack or chimney cutting through the lower part of the cliff as well as the adjacent snow/ice patch leading up to the headwall.
The rest of the story is now well-known and briefly as follows: Liu Lien-man tried four times to climb the wall, each time falling off exhausted. Chu Yin-hua then took over the lead. Unable to scale it by any other means, he removed his gloves, shoes and socks to gain a better grip on the rock (later losing his toes and parts of his fingers to frostbite). Finally, resorting to combined tactics and standing on Liu`s shoulders, Chu managed to get to the top of the cliff. With the help of a rope paid out from above, the three others followed. The Second Step had taken them five hours... But they carried on regardless, crossing the plateau above the step and towards the foot of the final pyramid. Here, at 8700 m, Liu Lien-man was too exhausted to continue and stayed behind, facing a night out in the open. Darkness had begun to fall as the three remaining climbers crawled their way upwards the summit snowfield, sometimes on all fours. Confronted with yet another sheer icy cliff, they were "forced to trudge along the northern slope, circle around the cliff westward toward the ridge in the north-west" [3] - which is exactly how later parties climbing the North Ridge described the final traverse along the upper part of the North face before regaining the summit ridge.[4] Utterly exhausted, and with their oxygen supplies running out, the three Chinese dragged themselves up the last few metres, reaching the top at 4.20 Peking Time. For the first time Everest had been climbed from the north. Or had it?
Much of the voiced scepticism at that time has died down since then and, as Walt Unsworth puts it, "there is now much more readiness generally to believe that the Chinese did succeed in 1960." [5] Further analysis of the highest Chinese picture, originally believed to be taken from near the First Step at 8500 m [6], suggested that it was taken from a point a little above the Second Step - or at 8700 m as the Chinese had claimed.[7] Together with the recently surfaced corroboration of topographical details, such as certain aspects of the Second Step or the final pyramid, there should be no shadow of doubt that the Chinese did indeed climb the Second Step, the last obstacle on the way to the summit, in 1960. And if they did, there is no reason to suppose they hadn`t reached the top, although some die-hards may maintain that the details mentioned in the later article, issued in the early 80`s, could have been incorporated after observations made during the second Chinese ascent of Everest in 1975...
Perhaps the final answer lies in a small plaster bust of Mao Tse-tung, covered with stones and placed on a large rock somewhere to the north-west of the summit...[8] It should still be there, for nobody has found it yet - a case for some high-altitude archaeologist. -
[Anyway, if you failed to reach the top of a mountain, would you claim to have left behind something as significant as a plaster bust on its summit when there is almost a hundred-percent chance that sooner or later someone will go and look for it...?]
Appendix 2 - Notes and references:
|
1 |
Shih Chan-chun, "The Conquest of Mount Everest by the Chinese Mountaineering Team", Alpine Journal, Vol. 66, 1961 |
|
2 |
Wang Fu-chou (or Fuzhou), "The Conquest of Mount Qomolangma from the North Side", from High Mountain Peaks in China - Newly opened to Foreigners, Peking/Tokyo, 1981 |
|
3 |
Wang Fu-chou and Chu Yin-hua, "How we climbed the World`s Highest Peak", Mountaincraft, July/September 1961 |
|
4 |
some examples are: "At 12.30, they were about 50-60 m from the world`s highest peak. An
almost perpendicular ice slope blocked their advance. The climbers had to
make a 30-40 m detour to the north, negotiated a rocky cliff and made a
transversal westward." "A rising traverse across a windslab break line led out on to a
broken and awkward spur [the North Pillar] and more snow-covered slabs
[...], with the summit tower the last obstacle. A long ramp with three
steep rocksteps led on to the summit ridge." "The route traverses right and goes up tricky mixed ground to the
summit ridge." |
|
5 |
Unsworth, W., Everest, Sparkford, 1989; Appendix 4, p. 558 |
|
6 |
Merrick, H., "Everest: The Chinese Photograph", Alpine Journal, Vols. 67/68, 1962/63 |
|
7 |
Goodfellow, B., "Chinese Everest Expedition 1960: A Further
Commentary", Alpine Journal, Vol. 66, 1961 |
|
8 |
according to Wang Fu-chou, op. cit. |