(Lyon) Two German climbers were still missing on Tuesday after the fall of a serac, a huge block of ice detached from a glacier, which killed a Frenchman and injured four other people on Monday in the Mont Blanc massif, according to the Bonneville (Haute-Savoie) prosecutor’s office.
“An ice axe was found at the edge of a crevasse. The hypothesis is that the avalanche threw them there,” Jean Ailhaud, deputy prosecutor of Bonneville, told AFP. “Given the amount of snow that fell into the crevasse, it is too dangerous to go down there.”
Searches in the area of the accident were suspended late Monday morning due to the size of the area and the significant risk of further rockfalls, rescuers said.
Further searches had yielded nothing by the end of the day on Tuesday, indicated the Chamonix high mountain gendarmerie platoon (PGHM).
The two Germans, aged 30 and 39, had spent the night at the Cosmiques refuge, located at the foot of Mont-Blanc du Tacul, where the accident occurred on the night of Sunday to Monday, according to the PGHM.
The serac fell around 3 a.m. on the north face of Tacul, at an altitude of around 4,100 metres, while around fifteen people in total were engaged in the ascent of Mont Blanc.
As soon as the alert was raised, major rescue operations were mobilised with helicopters, two dog teams and rescuers. When they arrived, they discovered a 57-year-old Frenchman on the surface who had died after “cardio-respiratory arrest”, according to the Bonneville prosecutor’s office.
A 42-year-old man was transferred to Annecy hospital and placed in intensive care, suffering from a cerebral hemorrhage, and a 40-year-old woman, injured in the lungs, was evacuated to Sallanches, according to the same source.
A 58-year-old Spaniard and his 17-year-old son were taken to Sallanches hospital after blocks of ice caused them “a fracture in the cervical region” and “a fracture in an ankle”.
With the exception of this father, all the injured are French, according to the PGHM.
A rope team of four people, one of three people and two of two people were also on the route at the time of the serac fall, but escaped unharmed.