However, the massif remained unclimbed until 1960. The Amne Machin mountains had been overflown by a few American pilots who overestimated the elevation to 30,000 feet (9,100 m). A 1930 article of the National Geographic estimated the peak elevation to 28,000 feet [8,500 m] according to the report of Joseph Rock, an American botanist and explorer who, despite death threats from the Golog Tibetans, had ventured to within 80 km of the mountain. For a while, the mountains were considered as a possible place for a peak higher than Mount Everest. While Rock only downgraded his estimate publicly in 1956 to not much more than 21,000 feet, he did give a detailed description of the peaks:[T]he Am-nye Ma-Chhen Range has three prominent peaks; the southern pyramid (second highest) is called Spyan-ras-gzigs (Chenrezig), the Avalokitesvara, of which the Dalai Lama is believed to be an incarnation; the central lower peak, a smaller pyramid, Am-nye Ma-Chhen; and the northern, which is the highest, a huge, round, broad dome called dGra-hdul-rlung-shog (Dra-dul-lung-shog) Victor of enemies wind wing ... The dome in the north is the highest part, but it is not so imposing as the large pyramid at the southern end. By 1980 Anyi Machen had been resurveyed at .