Deployment due to vacationer

“Sidewalk was gone” – fell into the Ötztaler Ache river

The mountain rescuers pulled the fallen man by rope from the stream bed up to the road.(Bild: Bergrettung Sölden)

In a strange operation, mountain rescuers in Sölden, Tyrol, pulled a drunken vacationer (40) out of the Ötztaler Ache river on Wednesday night. The drunk man had changed direction after a visit to a pub and had fallen into the river.

So far in 2024, Sölden Mountain Rescue can't complain about a lack of work. However, the team led by local station manager Franz Josef Fiegl will not soon forget mission number 29 - not because of any particular challenge, but because of the circumstances.

The mountain rescuers pulled the fallen man out of the stream bed up to the road using a rope.(Bild: Bergrettung Sölden)

Alarm shortly before midnight
At exactly 11.57 pm on Tuesday, the Sölden mountain rescuers received an alarm from the Tyrol control center. "A person was in the bed of the Ötztaler Ache stream and couldn't get out," says head of operations Maximilian Riml. Of course, the victim was not somewhere in a remote area, but in the Ache near the village center.

The German was crouching on a stone in the bed of the Ötztaler Ache stream.(Bild: Bergrettung Sölden)

"The man had raised the alarm himself. When we arrived on site, a police patrol was already there," says Riml. "The victim was crouching on a stone on the stream bed below the road." The 40-year-old German vacationer waited there to be rescued.

Only suffered abrasions
The emergency services then pulled the man up the ten meters of the main road using a rope. Fortunately, he only suffered abrasions.

The holidaymaker had mixed up the direction from the restaurant back to his accommodation - he was walking out of the valley. We were on the scene with nine men.

Maximilian Riml, Einsatzleiter Bergrettung Sölden

Bild: Bergrettung Tirol

"Suddenly the sidewalk came to an end," said the visibly drunk vacationer, looking for an explanation for his fall in both senses of the word. "The man had been on his way home from a pub in the village center to his accommodation, but went in the wrong direction on the village street," explains mountain rescuer Riml. He then crossed the road and ended up in the Ache - because the sidewalk had just come to an end. "He wasn't able to get back up the rocky embankment on his own."

The mountain rescuers joined forces to pull the 40-year-old up.(Bild: Bergrettung Sölden)

"Service" transport home
The 40-year-old did not even need to see a doctor. So the Sölden mountain rescuers brought him back to his accommodation - as a "service", so to speak.