Jacques Ottonello

In winter, the Mont-Blanc massif attracts thousands of skiers, hikers and mountaineers. For some, the stay turned into a tragedy, requiring the intervention of the men of the high mountain gendarmerie platoon of Chamonix. During a winter, Nicolas Moscara followed these professionals, using cameras placed on their helmets to obtain spectacular and original images. Thus, he filmed rescues deep in the mountain: the descent into hell of Rino, trapped for 24 hours in a crevasse or the miraculous rescue of Michael, an American skier who fell in the heart of the glacier.

The Mont-Blanc with its 4810 metres is the dream destination of countless alpinists. When the Valais mountain guide and Everest climber Kilian Volken sets off on this tour with two guests on 12 July 2012, an avalanche breaks out on Mont Maudit and nine people die, only Volken (61) survives badly injured, only his head and hands are still sticking out of the hard snow masses. On his harness he feels the pull of the rope on which the bodies of his two guests hang. Tears wet his face, but he can't wipe them off. Why did he was the only survivor? Volken doesn't see any logic in it, can't sleep without psychotropic drugs - he is the extreme mountaineer who has climbed three more 8000m peaks besides Mount Everest.