The avalanche danger in the mountains is high.
In the Austrian states of Tyrol and Vorarlberg alone, six winter sports enthusiasts and one snow plow driver have died since Friday.
A 31-year-old ski tourer from Wackersberg died in an accident in South Tyrol.
Wackersberg/South Tyrol – There have been warnings of avalanches in winter sports areas for days.
in the Alps at the weekend at least seven people died in the snow masses.
Two ski tourers from Bavaria also reached their limits in strong winds and poor visibility.
For one of the two, the trip ended fatally.
The avalanche danger in the mountains is currently high
The two women from Upper Bavaria were traveling east of Bozen on the Limojoch on Sunday morning when they got caught in a large snowdrift.
"I was perplexed that the two started at all," said Diego Clara, spokesman for the South Tyrolean mountain rescue service.
"There was dust and wind, the wind speed was 120 km/h."
At an altitude of 2200 meters, an avalanche swept the two women away.
"It wasn't particularly steep at this point," emphasizes the spokesman.
"The avalanche wasn't particularly big either, the edge was only a meter high." But the snow was so powerful that one of the two tourers, a 31-year-old woman from Wackersberg near Bad Tölz, was deeply buried.
German touring group had noticed the misfortune and helped with the search
A German tour group, who overheard the accident, rushed over and tried to find the victims.
They managed to save one of the women unharmed.
"The tourers helped with the first rescue," said the spokesman.
40 emergency services rushed to the scene of the accident with snowmobiles and caterpillar vehicles from the shelters and with a rescue helicopter, which had to turn back because of the strong gusts of wind.
Diego Clara says: "The second casualty could only be dug up after an hour." She was found at a depth of two and a half meters.
Resuscitation measures were unsuccessful, the 31-year-old could only be recovered dead.
Mountain rescuers brought her friend, who was hypothermic and in shock, to the next hut, where she was looked after by the emergency chaplain.
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Avalanche accident near Sölden: skier falls when jumping and triggers snow slab
The day before, three men, one of them a German, were caught in an avalanche near Sölden in the Obergurgl ski area.
As the Tyrolean police announced, the skiers aged 22, 32 and 39 left the mountain station of the Wurmkogelbahn in the direction of Königstal on Saturday afternoon.
They left the official runway and stopped above the Königsbach to shoot a video of a jump over an edge of the terrain.
The 22-year-old from Rhineland-Palatinate filmed, the 32-year-old from China jumped over the edge of the terrain, lost control of his skis and fell.
In doing so, he unleashed a slab of snow about 150 meters wide, from which he was swept away and buried 100 meters down to the bottom of the Königstal.
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Wind and poor visibility made the rescue work difficult for the rescuers on the Limojoch.
© Mountain Rescue South Tyrol
The slab of snow also pulled the 22-year-old along, but he was able to quickly free himself from the avalanche.
While he was looking for the buried person with the tracking device, the 39-year-old Chinese made the emergency call.
"The buried person was located after ten minutes," said a spokesman for the state police in Tyrol.
"But he was ten feet under the snow." That was taking too much time.
"After 15 minutes, the chance of survival decreases." Under resuscitation measures, the emergency services brought him to the emergency helicopter, where the man finally died.
In St. Anton, two ski tourers (29 and 33 years old) died in avalanches, a 62-year-old tourer in Kaunertal and a 17-year-old New Zealander in Zillertal.
In East Tyrol, the driver of a snow plow was found dead under snow masses on Sunday.
In Kleinwalsertal, emergency services found a 55-year-old German dead on Saturday who had been missing since Friday.
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