A German hiking group consisting of five people chose a climbing tour on the Internet – and completely misjudged the route in Tyrol.
Kufstein – Mountain hiking and climbing are more popular than ever before. Especially since apps and hiking websites have been spitting out loads of adventurous routes where you can take breathtaking sleddings, the mountain rescuers have to go out on dangerous missions again and again. Because the information from the web should often be treated with caution.
On Tuesday, a family from the Black Forest and an acquaintance of theirs from Freiburg had chosen a climbing route on the Wilder Kaiser near Kufstein in Tyrol (Austria) on the Internet that was far too difficult for the quintet. A nine-hour rescue operation by the Kufstein mountain rescue service followed.
Via ferrata in Tyrol is only for advanced climbers – German family was overwhelmed
The Kaiserschützensteig is a very long, somewhat challenging tour to the highest peak of the Wilder Kaiser, the Ellmauer Halt (2344 meters). The approach is through the Kaisertal, which is closed to cars, so you start right at the bottom of the valley. There are many unsecured climbing passages of grades I and II. Father, mother, son, daughter and a friend chose this tour on the Internet and set off on Monday in the worst possible weather.
“They started from a hut and climbed to the Ellmauer Halt, where they only arrived at 1 p.m.,” reports the head of the mountain rescue service, Robert Baumgartner, to the oRf“Then she wanted to descend via the Kaiserschützensteig, but in four hours she only managed to climb three hundred meters.” That was the point at which she realized she couldn't go any further. The family made an emergency call.
Thick fog on summit in Austria prevented rescue by helicopter
A rescue helicopter could not carry out an evacuation flight due to fog, so 13 mountain rescuers and one mountain rescuer went to the Hans Berger Haus and climbed on foot to the start of the Kaiserschützensteig. At the start of the via ferrata, the mountain rescuers equipped themselves with climbing harnesses and other equipment and climbed up to the exhausted people. After two hours, the mountain rescuers were with the exhausted people. There they were made fit for the descent, with cereal bars and the like helping.
In rain and poor visibility, the entire group then descended safely to the Kaiserschützensteig, and from there they had to descend the rest of the way to the Hans-Berger-Haus. There, the rescue team was fed by the hut's landlady at one o'clock. The family had apparently blindly trusted the route from the Internet, Baumgartner said to the oRf: “I wouldn't rely on most of the tours recommended on the Internet because everyone can share something there. It's smarter to hire a mountain guide.”
Recently, mountaineers in Austria had to rescue a father and daughter from a via ferrata because they had no experience. Another hiker was barefoot on a via ferrata in the Salzkammergut and got into trouble. In Tyrol, hikers called the mountain rescue service because they had missed the last gondola down to the valley.
