At the end of June RBS student Jort van Dalen and cameraman Fernando Lasso travelled to Chamonix, a town at the foot of Mont Blanc in France. They wanted to take an RBS flag to the top of the mountain as part of a promotional film for the subject of project management. The clip had to fit the theme of ‘exceed expectations.’

A good guide

It was a wild plan for the two untrained climbers. The boys asked guide Jelle Staleman to teach them the basics of climbing before their journey to the top of the highest mountain in western Europe. The journey however didn’t really go to plan. After training to be able to climb the mountain safely, the weather threw a spanner in the works.

Shortly before leaving, Jort could already see the storm coming. ‘We kept an eye on the weather for a few weeks and had seen that there had been a lot of precipitation. And precipitation at that altitude means snow. But the passes still appeared to be accessible, so we still went. Once there, the snow made for great photos, but it also meant there was a risk of avalanches. During the training with the guide, we saw the sliding snow falling in the distance. Impressive, but also extremely dangerous.’

Risk of avalanche

A few days before the students were about to begin their journey, an avalanche devoured one guide and a few climbers. Their guide decided to play it safe and to cancel the climb to the top of Mont Blanc. Jort: ‘We were rather disappointed: it was Mont Blanc’s name and reputation that attracted us in the first place. But we knew we were embarking on an adventure. And an adventure is only an adventure if you don’t know where you’ll end up before you start. Thankfully there are plenty of other peaks around to climb.’

A new plan took shape in no time: the group would first conquer La Tour Ronde and after that they were going to tackle the Arête des Cosmiques. The alternative plan would prove to suit the boys really well. Jort: These climbs turned out to be much cooler. We now also had to rock climb and abseil, and we had to get our crampons and ice axes out. We had only just learned all these techniques and now we had to put them into practice, because we wouldn’t have gotten to the top otherwise. It was a steep learning curve, but it was amazing!’

Promotional film

Now Jort is back at sea level and all the images of the climb have been shot, they are hard at work to make the promotional film a reality. It has to be finished before the start of the new academic year.

Tosca Sel