Fernand Petzl (April 7, 1913 – May 31, 2003) was a

caver Caving, also known as spelunking (United States and Canada) and potholing (United Kingdom and Ireland), is the recreational pastime of exploring wild cave systems (as distinguished from show caves). In contrast, speleology is the scientific ...

and manufacturer of outdoor equipment under the brand name

Petzl Petzl is a French manufacturer of climbing gear, caving gear, work-at-height equipment, and headlamps based in Crolles (near Grenoble), France. The company was created by the cave explorer Fernand Petzl in the mid-1970s. Their three speci ...

. Petzl lived most of his life in the village of Saint-Ismier (near

Grenoble Grenoble ( ; ; or ; or ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of the Isère Departments of France, department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regions of France, region ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

at the foot of the mountain Dent De Crolles. He first went

caving Caving, also known as spelunking (United States and Canada) and potholing (United Kingdom and Ireland), is the recreational pastime of exploring wild cave systems (as distinguished from show caves). In contrast, speleology is the scientific ...

in Trou du Glaz in 1933, and was immediately captivated by the idea of exploring beyond the

cave Caves or caverns are natural voids under the Earth's Planetary surface, surface. Caves often form by the weathering of rock and often extend deep underground. Exogene caves are smaller openings that extend a relatively short distance undergrou ...

's known limits. Subsequent explorations there with Pierre Chevalier, Charles Petit-Didier and others culminated in connections to other caves in the massif, forming the Réseau de la Dent de Crolles which, in 1947, became the deepest cave in the world. Petzl also participated in explorations in the Gouffre Berger, which set a new world depth record in 1956 as the first cave deeper than 1000 metres (-1122m). Petzl was a proponent of cave explorations by small teams, an innovation at the time. During this period, when there were no manufacturers of specialized caving equipment, cavers adapted equipment from other sources, or made their own. After 1933 Petzl began making rope ladders for his own use, developed a scaling-pole in 1940, and began testing the first nylon ropes in 1942. In 1968 Bruno Dressler asked Petzl, who worked as a metals machinist, to build a rope-ascending tool he had developed, and in the 1970s Petzl started a small caving equipment manufacturing company that bore his name. In subsequent years the Petzl brand was expanded to include climbing and ski-mountaineering gear, and continues today as one of the world’s best–known manufacturers of mountaineering equipment.

References

* Meredith, Mike ''Interview with Fernand Petzl'', Caving International no.7, 1980. * Chevalier, Pierre ''Subterranean Climbers'', Faber & Faber, 1951 and Zephyrus Press, 1975. 1913 births 2003 deaths French cavers 20th-century French businesspeople French people of Romanian descent French people of German descent {{France-business-bio-stub