Lost on the mountain

Three creepy mysteries in the Ötztal Alps

A Pistenbully removed parts of the avalanche in December - but the victim remained missing.

(Bild: BR)

A local man who was buried at Christmas in St. Leonhard in the Tyrolean Pitztal valley is still lying under the avalanche. There has been almost no trace of two other people missing on the mountain for almost two years.

"I don't dare to predict when we will find the 46-year-old." Peter Gasteiger, head of the Alpine Police in the Imst district, cannot say at the beginning of May how long the man from Pitztal will remain under the avalanche that buried him on December 23, 2023 in the area of the Rappenkopf in Pitztal.

Still a relatively large amount of snow at the accident site
The answer can only come from the melting snow. "I was in the area of the accident site myself around three weeks ago and there was still quite a lot of snow there," explains Gasteiger. There will be no further search operation. However, the alpine police and mountain rescue team want to check the site at certain intervals to see if nature has released the body in the meantime.

A Pistenbully removed parts of the avalanche in December - but the victim remained missing.

(Bild: BR)

Snowfall forecast again
After the operation at Christmas, the mountain rescuers set up poles to narrow down the area where the body is likely to be located. "Perhaps objects that lead us to the victim will soon be piling up," hopes Gasteiger.

Of course, there was more snow in April, and snowfall is also forecast for the next few days in the area of the accident site (around 2,200 meters).

If the avalanche victim is not too deep under the masses of snow, the man could soon be found. In principle, everything now depends on how the weather develops in the near future.

Peter Gasteiger, Leiter der Alpinpolizei im Bezirk Imst

German (79) is still missing behind Vent
The Ötztal Alps around the Ramolhaus (3005 m) near Obergurgl hold another spooky secret. There, on August 18, 2022, a 79-year-old German set off alone to the Martin-Busch-Hütte in Vent. The hiker, who had no cell phone with him, wanted to walk over the Ramoljoch to the neighboring refuge. However, he never arrived there.

The Alpine Police searched for the missing man again in the summer of 2023 during training courses - unfortunately in vain. The German remains missing.

Never returned from a hike 
The same applies to a 52-year-old man from Ötztal. He had set off on a hike in Gries im Sulztal at the beginning of January 2023 - and never returned. All efforts to find the man failed.

It will probably be down to chance when the Ötztal mountains reveal the three spooky secrets.