Grand Couloir du Goûter, a classic route up Mont Blanc has the morbid but fitting nickname “Death Couloir” as it has been the site of over 100 mountaineer deaths. Rockfalls like the one featured in the below video a one of the main factors makes Grand Couloir du Goûter one of the most accident-prone areas in the Alps.
Preventative measures have been instituted over the years including the 2009 Petzl Foundation financed an accident prevention study project focusing mainly on this spot. Pascal Chapelland, mountain advisor to the Haute-Savoie prefect, and François Marsigny, head of the mountaineering department at the National Ski and Mountaineering School (Ensa) even suggested a complete removal of the metal cables guidelines to discourage inexperienced climbers a false sense of security but the cable remains and so does the high death rate (3.7 per year). A strong correlation between rockfall frequency and air temperature has been recognized with a 2 hour delay between peak air temperature and peak rockfall activity with an average of one rockfall event every 17-minutes between 11:00am and 12:00pm.
The above footage was taken 10:00am and 10:30 along the Goûter Route. In it a mountaineer seeks shelter as a rockfall cascades down directly over the cable that was suggested to be removed. The mountaineer is lucky to have been pinned down in a relatively safe position and not traversing at the time of the rockfall. This window of time falls just outside peak rockfall activity. It is clear in the video why this is considered such a lethal zone for mountaineers.
