In late September, a team of climbers from a National Geographic film crew made an astonishing discovery on Mount Everest. As they explored a glacier beneath the north face, they spotted a brown leather boot emerging from the ice. Upon closer inspection, a sock with a patch bearing the stitched red letters 'A.C. Irvine' was revealed. The find could be a crucial piece in the longstanding mystery of what happened to Sandy Irvine, a young engineer and inexperienced climber, who along with accomplished mountaineer George Mallory, vanished on a historic expedition to Everest's summit in 1924.

Their disappearance has puzzled historians and adventurers for generations. Jimmy Chin, a noted mountaineer and filmmaker, expressed the crew's shock, saying, "We just stumbled upon one of the great discoveries of our time."

In 1924, Irvine, then 22, joined Mallory in a groundbreaking climb reaching heights of 27,000 feet. This latest discovery might finally unravel the nearly century-old enigma surrounding that fateful expedition.