Climbing Mont Blanc to be Policed
Police safety checks on Three Monts & Gouter route to Mont Blanc
With the ever-going popularity of climbing the Mont Blanc, the Haute Savoie Prefect have voted unanimously to police both the Gouter Route and the Three Monts Route up to the Mont Blanc from June to September.
In a statement issued by the Haute Savoie Prefect and the Mayor of Saint Gervais, the Gouter (Normal) and the Three Monts route will be manned by a number of gendarmes (police) from mid-June to September.
The mayor, Jean-Marc Peillex, has argued for over 10 years that the increasingly popular (~20,000 per year) activity of climbing the highest peak in Western Europe needs to be better managed from a safety point of view.
From the badly equipped to the physically unprepared the Mont Blanc has seen it's shares of injuries and fatalities, on top of this the number of fake or unqualified guides that have been identified leading paying clients on the Mont Blanc is significant.
The Mont Blanc is a protected site, as such no form of camping is permitted however bivouacs are common occurrences for climbers avoiding the use of the refuges en route. Only at the Tête Rousse is bivoauc permitted, as such the gendarme will be present to ensure no illegal camping happens.
As well as policing, protection will also come in the form of education, with a Mont Blanc ambassador at the Nid d'Aigle. Nepalese climber Phinto Tsering Sherpa will remind mountaineers on the Mont Blanc of best practise and code of conduct on the mountain.
