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Hikers last weekend on the Grossglockner in Austria (symbol picture)
Photo: Eibner-Pressefoto / EXPA / Groder / imago images / Eibner Europa
Ten German hikers underestimated the onset of winter in the Austrian Alps and had to be rescued by helicopter.
The mountain athletes between the ages of 25 and 69 were stuck in the fresh snow, as the police announced.
Among the hikers were five people from Thuringia, three from Bavaria and one person each from Hesse and Rhineland-Palatinate.
All ten were unharmed.
The group had spent the weekend in a hut in Saalfelden am Steinernen Meer in Pinzgau and, according to the police report, made their way down to the valley on Sunday morning, although the hut landlady had advised them not to do so because of the fresh snow.
"Visibly relieved"
On Sunday morning, the landlady worried about snow slides caused by rising temperatures.
She alerted the mountain rescue team, which discovered the hikers stuck in the snow at an altitude of around 2000 meters.
"After making contact with the visibly relieved people," said the police, the rescuers flew the uninjured hikers to an alpine pasture and then descended with them.
The hikers now have to pay for the costs of the mission themselves.
"Even if only a few centimeters of snow is announced, two to three meter high snow drifts can arise in the mountains," warned mountain rescuer Markus Reichholf.
Icon: The mirror
lmd / dpa