All hell breaks loose in the Cosmiques couloir

Tues 29th: Apologies in advance for a huge wall of text... Probably the most eventful 24h I've had in Chamonix.

On the evening of the 28th I went down for a quick drink to see Sonny and Luke for their last night in Chamonix, knowing that I had to be up early for potentially the deepest day of the season. I had also missed two powder days in a row... there was no way I was missing this. A quiet drink turned into getting pretty smashed as we pounded more and more G+Ts, beers, shots etc. At 3:30am I ended up back in bed having; broken up a fight, added a few vodka-cokes to the tally and spent 2h in the hot tub. Pretty epic night. 

Needless to say at 7am the next day I didn't feel so epic... Regardless I met Steve, TomTom, Robyn and their friend Romain at the Midi at 7:45. Eventually the CDMB called a 9:30 first bin and opened the queue. Our goal had originally been the Cosmiques couloir but during the previous night I'd psyched myself out due to fearing the un-skied metre+ of fresh snow in three days would be a deathtrap. As a result TT hadn't bought his 60m rope (Steve still had his). I decided to walk to TT's whilst we waited and to pick up the rope, just in case... A lovely woman drove me back to the Midi on her way to work. We made the first bin anyway - score.

At the top Steve and I split off from the others (who had time issues) and decided to go take a peek and just see what happened. We got to the couloir with a few people ahead of us. As I was prepping the rope and Steve was scoping our entry a guy slipped on the ice above the first rappel and bounced 'like a rag doll' down the slope, straight over two rock bands and out of sight. Various calls were made; the PGHM were alerted and contact was made via his mobile; he was conscious at least. The two groups that were already entering/in the couloir continued on down.

The guy fell from the couloir above the dog leg left of
centre and was evacuated from below the rock bottom right

Steve was visibly shaken having actually seen the incident and so we took a timeout to assess our options. The noise of the helicopter was heard, making two passes, then silence. Whilst we were waiting thick cloud blew over from Italy obscuring the alternative descent down Rognon. Of the two options I'd rather take the one with the visibility. The exit over seracs du geant had been sketchy enough a few days before, even with visibility. Steve agreed so we got ready... We chose the right hand entry. Three people had already side slipped in and down to the first rap point. Taking into account what we'd just seen we rapped down to them, just to be safe. As I was half way down they started to climb back up. They'd seen the incident and changed their minds.

After faffing around letting them climb past etc Steve and I started prepping the main rappel. I headed off first with skis on, descended 50m, having to unknot the rope twice, and found a nice protected stance. Steve followed down and the guy above kindly untied our ropes. The first 20m was steep and bulletproof, like the first Rond... I just sideslipped down with edges in and legs wide and was fine. Steve followed with his ice axe.

Eventually we got started and found that most of the couloir had slid the day before and that it was impossible to tell what was bulletproof and what was deep powder. Regardless, the conditions were good enough to open up and link turns, just had to be constantly ready for the bulletproof. From time to time we found some stunning snow, mainly in runnels between the slides.

Steve with his comically oversized bag

Finally some good snow

After 400m vert or so I saw two guys in high vis vests waving at me. I made my way to the edge to get out of the way and watched the two PGHM paramedics get evacuated by the helicopter hanging wire in two passes. Pretty amazing to see. It was a surprise to see them as we'd already waited for the helicopter to come and go twice before starting our first rappel. We carried on down quickly just wanting to get out. We'd already spent far too long in the couloir and it was getting MUCH hotter. Near the bottom a large sluff came down off the south facing side. We got out as soon as possible over the big bergschrund and onto Bossons glacier.

PGHM being airlifted out

Big sluff coming down from the South side

At least the views were epic

The snow on Bossons was the best of the day, exactly what we'd been hoping for in the couloir. The traverse back was seriously hard work. The combination of hangover, dehydration, lack of food and sleep and heat left me weak. If I'm honest it's up there as the most exhausted I've felt on skis. There was a pretty technical scramble mid way. I actually slipped whilst trying to balance my 10kg of skis in front of me but stopped myself. Lucky as there was a pretty big cliff band 20m below.

Best five turns of the day

Breathtaking traverse... still sketchy as hell

Steve had been trying to talk me into skiing the para face and I really wasn't interested. However my will power was at an all time low and so eventually I reluctantly agreed. The snow got heavy quickly, as I'd predicted. Lower down I basically collapsed and we took a break. I stripped right down, had some water and instantly felt WAY better. If I'd just done it earlier...

We combat skied to the old lift station. Skis went on the backpack and jackets came off and we hiked down to town. It took us a good two hours for the 600m vert descent but I was actually feeling much better. Still, I got home knackered and had a well deserved night in.

Steve looking... well... special

Grumpy being made to walk down

Was it an epic day? Did it seem worth it at the time? Would I do it again? Hell yes, hell no and happily. What have I learnt? Mainly that I'm a pragmatist. Of course I wish that the guy hadn't fallen and I really hope he's OK. However I already knew full well that that, or far worse, is a possible outcome for some of the activities we choose to do. Does it mean I'll stop doing the things I love because there's that tiny chance? Not a chance...