In the mid afternoon of Thursday 4 January 2024, a skier was caught in a avalanche on the Glacier Rond, on the north-west face of the Aiguille du Midi.
The skier is a speedrider. Speedriders deploy a small paraglider wing to ride and fly over the snow, ice and crevasses. In this descent, the wing was not deployed as the Glacier Rond is too steep to speedride. The skier, who is not originally from Chamonix, was skiing with his wing in his bag when the avalanche hit him and took him to the bottom of this very steep off-piste ski route.
Fortunately, the Chamonix High Mountain Gendarmerie Platoon (PGHM) was contacted quickly. Within minutes a Choucas 74 helicopter was on a direct route over Plan d'Aiguille to the foot of the Glacier Rond, where the skier was located and was found to have sustained multiple and serious injuries.
The patient was on-boarded to the helicopter, which took a direct route to the hospital in Annecy.
Le Dauphiné
