We headed out from the refuge at dawn on Saturday 8th of July for a 3 hour walk with crampons to the start of the Arête West of Pointe des Aigles (3336m) in the French Alps. We switched to rock climbing shoes at around 9am.

At 10am, after a few pitches of rock climbing, I was leading about 20 meters above my friend belaying me.

Suddenly, a massive rock the size of a washing machine detached under my foot, grabbed the rope with it, and catapulted me violently backward. As I was falling, in a deafening noise of rock splitting in pieces, I was hit all over my body and thought that it was probably all over for me. I also thought that the rocks falling down would most likely crush my friend.

                                                                                                                                        Leo activating his ResQLink VIEW PLB

I was in total shock and couldn’t breathe. Pain all over my body but mostly from my left ankle.

After a while, I climbed to a safer spot, built an anchor with Camalots, and belayed my friend. We weighed the risks and decided to climb 30m up to a more comfortable spot.

The rope seriously damaged to the core, along with both our helmets, and my ankle worsened. Abseiling from there wasn’t an option anymore.

There was no cell phone coverage and my ACR Resqlink View PLB that I carried religiously during all my adventures was going to prove vital. I activated the signal at 11:48am, and without me knowing, the SAR personnel called my emergency contact 6 minutes later.

Two hours later, after coordinating the rescue and discussing a survival strategy for the cold, windy night, the helicopter arrived.

We had tears of joy and relief.

A quick and impressive heli-hoisting rescue, and then, luckily, we were on our way to the hospital, safe and sound. Thankfully, it was just a fractured ankle, along with lots of bruises, cuts, and damaged gear.