André Roch

André Roch (August 21, 1906 in Hermance, Switzerland – November 19, 2002 in Geneva) was a mountaineer, avalanche researcher and expert, skier, resort developer, engineer, and author. Roch is best known for having planned and surveyed the Aspen, Colorado ski resort, and also as an adviser on avalanche management whose expertise was sought throughout the world.

Roch was born near Geneva, Switzerland in 1906, the son of an academic physician who would later become the president of the University of Geneva. He was introduced to mountain sports by his father, who was an avid climber, and he learned to ski at an early age. He won both the downhill and the slalom races at the 1927 Student Olympics in Italy. In his youth he traveled and pursued university education in the United States.

Roch became a member of the Swiss Alpine Club in 1928 and later became the president of its Geneva section. While a university student in Oregon in 1931, Roch was a member of the Cascade Ski Club. On April 26, 1931, Roch and two fellow members of the Cascade Ski Club, Hjalmar Hvam and Arne Stene, became the first to descend on skis from the summit of Mount Hood.

Beginning in 1931, Roch made the first ascent of many routes in the Mont Blanc Massif. Over the course of his life, Roch made 25 first ascents in the Alps and 27 first ascents in Asia.Mont Forel in Schweizerland, East Greenland was first climbed by a Swiss expedition led by André Roch in 1938.

In 1952, at the age of 45, he was the most experienced member of a group of four Swiss climbers who, along with Tenzing Norgay, pioneered the route on Mount Everest which Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay used to reach the summit the following year. Two members of the 1952 expedition, Raymond Lambert and Norgay, reached to within 200 meters (656 feet) of the summit before being forced to turn back due to severe weather conditions and lack of oxygen.

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