Incredible find on Mont Blanc
It was about this time last year that we reported on some amazing discoveries that had been unearthed in the Bossons glacier – perfectly preserved artefacts from two Air India planes that had crashed on Mont Blanc over 50 years ago! Well, a few weeks back the same guy, Daniel Roche, came up trumps again when he found one of the propellers from the Malabar Princess, this time on the Italian side of the mountain.
Coming from Lyon, Roche, is well known in the area for his extensive collection of memorabilia from the Kangchenjunga (crashed 1969) and the Malabar Princess (crashed 1950). However, this find has got to be the best yet, but it came at a price. Removing a 3m propeller from a glacier is not an easy task and it's one he financed almost entirely himself. Accessing the site of his find (between the Mont Blanc and Miage glaciers) required the assistance of a helicopter, so when the French couldn't help him, he went to the Italians. It certainly caused quite a spectacle for the walkers and alpinists in the area when the chopper returned with its unusual cargo. When returning to France with his prize, Roche opted to take the St Bernard pass rather than have to explain himself to the border guards at the Mont Blanc tunnel!
Amazingly, after 57 years in the ice, the mechanics of the propeller still turn although it lost one of its three blades in the crash. It is the only prop to have been recovered from the crashes; the others having either been destroyed on impact or have fallen deep into the crevasses.
Roche hopes that one of the Mont Blanc communities might want to display the propeller as a monument to those who lost their lives in the crash. In the mean time though, he is putting on a small exhibition of his best “finds” in St Gervais at the end of the year (21st – 31st December).
Photo credit: Le Dauphine
