October 5, 1910 Géo Chavez crosses the Alps from Brig (Switzerland) to Domodossola (Italy) via the Simplon Pass. He crashes on landing and dies a few days later.
1913 In Le Fayet near Saint Gervais, THORET, known as Thoret-Mont Blanc, founded the Ecole des Remous (School of Turbulence).
1914 First flight over Mont Blanc by PARMELIN.
July 30, 1921 DURAFOUR lands on the Dôme du Gouter (4,330 m) with a Caudron G3 on wheels and hard snow.
1927 Creation of the Ecole de Haute Montagne (High Mountain School) in Le Fayet by Thoret (more interested in flying than landing in the mountains).
1929 Ernst UDET (German ace) lands on the Trient plateau (behind the Tour glacier).
1935 The 35th Aviation Regiment of Lyon-Bron tries wooden skis on its Potez 25, MS 230, and MS 330 aircraft. The idea is abandoned due to lack of success.
1945 to 1962 Firmin Guiron and his 180 hp Auster Workmaster equipped with wooden skis (later replaced by American FEDERAL skis) made numerous landings on the Argentière glacier below the Aiguille du Triolet.
January 1950 Henri GIRAUD took up the position of chief pilot at the Dauphiné flying club.
October 5, 1951: Swiss pilot André Zehr misses his wheeled landing at the Dôme du Gouter with his Piper Cub. A team led by Hermann Geiger rights and repairs the aircraft, replacing its propeller. André Zehr takes off using a bungee cord.
1952: Hermann Geiger makes his first landing on the Kander Glacier. Throughout the Swiss Valais region, he and his friend Fernand Martignoni develop their mountain landing technique using retractable skis. They perform numerous rescues, timber drops, and resupply missions on difficult-to-access slopes.
March 8, 1953: Henri Giraud takes off from Grenoble in a Castel 25 glider towards Chamrousse and achieves the highest glider landing ever recorded at 2,225 meters. He takes off using a bungee cord and then lands back in Grenoble.
1957: Tragedy strikes mountaineers Vincendon and Henry near the Dôme du Gouter with the loss of a rescue helicopter. Henri Giraud is motivated to acquire, like Hermann Geiger, a Piper PA 18 equipped with skis. Geiger, Giraud, and Martignoni fly together over the glaciers of the Swiss Valais.
June 23, 1960: Henri Giraud makes his first landing on the summit of Mont Blanc in his PA 18, "Le Choucas" (The Jackdaw). At this altitude, the 150 hp engine is reduced to only 70 hp. It lands over a distance of 30 meters…
July 1, 1961: Creation of Air Alpes by Michel Ziegler and Robert Merloz with two aircraft: a 150 hp Piper PA 18 for reconnaissance of landing sites in mid-mountain regions and glaciers, and a 530 hp Turboméca Astazou turbine-powered Pilatus for aerial work.
1975: Approximately 200 qualified mountain pilots in France, 12 altiports, and 110 landing areas of varying degrees of renown.
Today, the AFPM (Association of Mountain Pilots) has approximately 650 members, about 100 of whom regularly fly on glaciers.