Herzog’s extremities were numb up to his ankles and wrists. Lachenal’s toes and patches on the soles of his feet had turned black. Rébuffat had only frostnip on a pair of toes, and Terray had somehow avoided frostbite altogether. Three years later, the British expedition to Everest would climb more than 2,000 feet higher than the French on Annapurna, yet contract no serious frostbite. It is worth pausing to wonder why Herzog and Lachenal suffered such appalling damage on a single day’s push above 26,000 feet. The boots of the British insulated considerably better than those of the French, which had been designed for the Alps. Even so, back in the 1920s and 1930s teams had come home from high altitude in the Himalaya without serious frostbite. On Everest in 1922, the British discovered that they could not afford to wear crampons up high, because the straps that fixed them to the boots inevitably cut off circulation. As long as footgear was made of pliable leather (as were the French boots), that sinister tradeoff would manifest itself.
