A total of five people from Germany, including a nine-month-old baby, got into an alpine emergency on Thursday. After climbing from the Seebergsattel in the municipality of Bad Eisenkappel via the Krainersteig to the summit of the Carinthian Storschitz, waist-deep snow prevented a safe descent. The operations manager of the mountain rescue service, Gernot Koboltschnig, reports.
The group consisted of a couple – the man carrying the baby in a back carrier – a man and a woman and three dogs. All come from Germany. Attempting to descend from the summit at 4pm via the north face, waist-deep snow meant the group had to turn back to the summit to take a different route down to the valley. “Snow is often underestimated, especially on the shady sides of the mountains,” explains operations manager Koboltschnig. Rope rescue impossible due to wind In the area of a climbing passage, the people were again unable to continue and made an emergency call. A police helicopter went out to rescue the climbers from their predicament, but could not land in the summit area because of the stormy wind. “A rope rescue would have been simply impossible because of the wind,” reports Koboltschnig. Members of the mountain rescue and the alpine police therefore climbed towards the summit. Six members of the Bad Eisenkappel mountain rescue service Two Alpine police officers Police helicopter Baby warmed up under his jacketThe group communicated with them via telephone: “The poor reception made communication a bit difficult,” says Koboltschnig. The Germans were not only afraid for their own lives, but especially feared for the health of the baby. “We gave the instruction over the phone to push the baby out of the backpack under the jacket and onto your own body to prevent hypothermia,” Koboltschnig continued flown unharmed into the valley – all unhurt, but slightly hypothermic. The mountain rescue forces took care of the rescue of the three dogs and brought them back to the starting point. “Fortunately, this mission had a happy ending – everyone was safe before nightfall!”
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