The last image we have of him sees him wrapped in a voluminous phosphorescent yellow thermal suit, the snowboard already tied to his boots, looking towards the bed of snow and clouds below. An absolutely indecipherable foam. It was September 9, 2002 and he, Marco Siffredi – French athlete passionate about extreme descents – would have vanished into thin air shortly thereafter.
Snowboarding and climbing: irresistible passions
He was born in 1979 in Chamonix, Siffredi. He came from a family of mountaineers, which had infected him. His father was a mountain guide, his brother – much older than him – was an expert climber who however tragically met his death one bad day in 1981, swallowed up by an avalanche. What Marco did was also for him, to honor his memory. They gave him a snowboard at the age of sixteen and he never let it go. Except that it wouldn’t have been about using it for some peaceful descent into the lap of tourist resorts. He had other plans.
Child prodigy: descends Mont Blanc at 17 years old
Siffredi is a talent that cannot be locked away under a glass case. Thus, at just 17 years old, he climbed Mont Blanc and descended all the classic routes. His nature leads him to constantly raise the bar. Every time he accomplishes a feat he shrugs his shoulders: he must immediately accomplish another, greater one. As soon as she comes of age she faces Mallory at the Aiguille du Midi, a thousand meters of altitude difference. At nineteen he flew to Peru: with Philippe Forte and René Robert he went up and down the Tocilarajo, over 6 thousand meters high. Stopping for a moment is simply not an option. He goes to the Himalayas and climbs Dorje Lhakpa (6988 m) also descending here with the board. In 2000 he attempted Huayna Potosí, a treacherous Bolivian peak (6088 m). In the autumn of 2000 he then reached the first 8000 meter peak, Cho Oyu. But it’s still not enough. He wants more. He wants the ruler of the peaks.
Snowboarding on Mount Everest
Spring of 2001. Marco has decided that the time has come to challenge Everest. He reaches the top with the help of oxygen and two Sherpas, then straps on his board and begins the descent. The intense cold immediately causes scattered problems and must stop, and then start again. He descends to 6400 meters, unharmed, despite the poor visibility and the absence of a safe route: he is the first human being in the world to do so, together with the Austrian Stefan Gatt, who preceded him two days earlier. In the autumn of 2001 he tried to reach the summit of Shisha Pangma, but the winds were so strong that they forced him to stop at 7,000 meters above sea level, from where he descended.
September 2002: dissolved into thin air
Marco Siffredi continually raises. Now he intends to become the first man to descend the Hornbein Couloir, on the north face of Mount Everest. Having left Kathmandu in the first days of August 2002, he reached the summit on 9 September, accompanied by three Sherpas. The conditions are not ideal and he is advised to avoid the descent. Imagine: he came a long way to get here. He won’t back down. Below there is a narrow and steep channel, the one he should fit into. You can’t see anything though. A white cap of clouds and snow covers your eyes and thoughts. Siffredi stays up there for about an hour, then comes down. Since then no one has seen him again. He will never return to base camp. The next day a group of mountaineers goes to look for him, but only finds what appears to be the trail of the snowboard.
A close friend of his will say: “He fell asleep in the snow“. His body was never found again, but it still lies there, somewhere. His extreme search for freedom survived death.