Major search operation

150 meters: Hiker (55) fell to his death

The mountain rescue team and other emergency services searched for the man.

(Bild: Elmar Gubisch, Hubert Rauth (Symbolbild))

What happened at the weekend in Carinthia is a nightmare: on Sunday, a 55-year-old man set off on a hike from which he was never to return.

The 55-year-old set off on his hike in the early hours of July 21: The man from the district of Spittal wanted to hike from the Gößkarspeichersee lake to the Winterleiten summit in the area of the Gießener Hütte in the municipality of Malta. He first hiked along the Winterleiten ridge in the direction of the Zigmontspitze - then the accident happened.

For reasons still unknown, he probably slipped or stumbled on a subsequent summit. "As a result, he fell approx. 150 meters into the eastern flank of the Winterleitengrat and suffered fatal injuries," according to the police.

Search had to be called off
Because the man did not return home at the agreed time, his relatives filed a report. On Sunday afternoon, the police launched a search operation with two helicopters, which had to be called off around midnight without any results. The search was resumed on Monday morning.

At around 9 a.m., the emergency services were able to find the hiker on the eastern slope of the Winterleiten ridge - he had died in an accident. The Malta-Liesertal mountain rescue team, Spittal an der Drau mountain rescue team, four search dogs from the Carinthia mountain rescue team, the Spittal an der Drau alpine police, the police helicopter from Salzburg and the RK1 emergency helicopter were deployed.