These questions have no answers.

The six hours are a gap in the record that physiology can describe in general terms — here is what happens to the body during prolonged severe cold exposure — but cannot fill with the specifics of Jean Hilliard’s individual experience.

This gap is not a failure of science.

It is an honest acknowledgment of the limits of retrospective analysis.

We can study the physiology of hypothermia in laboratory settings, with monitoring equipment and controlled conditions.

We cannot retroactively instrument the porch step at Wally Nelson’s farmhouse and recover the vital sign data from six hours in 1980.