Mt. Baker - Day 68-67 ( Self -Arrest, Part 3)

The process of self-arrest begins with the ice ax and how it is carried should the need arise. The process ends with how this same tool is used to stop an unwanted fall. Needless to say that at a time of emergency, it is of no value if the ax is buried inside your backpack someplace below both endless bags of trail mix and clean underwear. No help, also, if the ax is dropped accidentally from your hand and falls below to meet the head of the hapless climber following your lead. This would be especially true if that same climber was tied to you by a rope. Knocked unconcience by the blow, your fellow adventurer would be at risk for an uncontrollable free-fall. The equally bad news would become readily apparent. You would quickly be pulled along. No chance at that critical moment to review the relevant instructions in Mountaineering: Freedom of the Hills (pgs 318-321) on how to prevent such catastrophies.

So was there such a situation then with Mallory and Irvine? Mallory was found with a signifcant depression on the front of the skull, the size of the traumatic defect matching the pick of their ice ax later discovered in 1933. Pictures of that ice ax showed no leash, ie, a cord attached to the carabiner hole in the ice ax head. This cord provides a sure way to attach the ice ax to your wrist. Could head trauma from a runaway ax previously lost from grip have resulted in loss of footing; both climbers, tied to each other then dragged down the steep slopes by the weight of their packs to an icy grave?

Could the depression found on Mallory's frontal bone have been caused by an improper grip on the ax? Is that a consideration? Read again to page 318 of the above provided reference. I'll repeat it here for those who do not have the book. "Place your thumb under the adze and your palm and fingers over the pick, near the top of the of the shaft. While you are climbing the adze points forward". Makes sense? Not likely if you have never held an ice ax. Anyway, the wrong grip puts you at greater danger of the ax pick puncture wound during a fall.; a wound, again not dissimilar to that noted on Mallory's body.

What about the proper technique of self-arrest? Here again, I would remind you that Mallory was summiting Everest with the inexperienced partner, Andrew Irvine. Pictures of our hero's young associate at the beginning of the ill-fated 1924 expedition showed him saddled with two large oxygen cannisters on his back, looking more like a lost scooba diver than an intrepid mountaineer. A gail of wind or loose footing on the powdery snow and rock could have tipped him over backwards, head first, glisssading on his back down the majestic slopes. The oxygen cannisters at that point would have functioned more like the hulls of a slick catamoran sailboat on a windy day than a source of what the Himalayan locals called "English air". It would be certain that Mallory would have been pulled along, each having each been tied together by a common rope.

The proper self-arrest technique to have been used by Irvine in such a circumstance is described in detail on page 320 of our reference. Self-arrest in such a position as possibly his would be considered the most difficult to achieve. "Hold the ax across your torso and aggressively jab the pick into the snow; then twist and roll toward it. Once again, the pick placed to the side serves as a pivot point. Planting the pick will not bring you around to the final self-arrest position. You need to work at rolling your chest toward the ax head while you work your legs to swing around and point downhill. A sitting-up motion helps the roll". Remember that if you are falling down a precipitous slope at 80 miles an hour, you may have problems putting on your glasses in order to read this section of the book. Only previous practice would make the difference and one could easily question whether Irvine was properly skilled in the technique. This, as it is now, would be the end of the consideration of the proper form of self-arrest.

So what is the bottom line in this multiday series of blogs on self -arrest? The answer - order a good mountaineering book such as the one recommended here, buy a sturdy ice ax (preferably with a leash!), and build yourself an icy slope to practice. Oh yeah, I nearly forgot. Perhaps equally important ----pray you are not tied to an inexperienced climber.