“They found themselves stranded without shelter.” The four climbers trapped since Saturday in Mont Blanc have been found dead, the Chamonix High Mountain Gendarmerie Platoon (PGHM) announced to France 3 Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Rhône-Alpes on Tuesday.
The bodies of these four climbers, two Italians and two Koreans, were found early Tuesday afternoon not far from the summit of Mont Blanc. “They were caught in the bad weather conditions this Saturday and found themselves stranded without shelter,” the commander of the Chamonix PGHM, Étienne Rolland, told France 3. The climbers died “of exhaustion”, the Haute-Savoie prefecture told AFP.
“Very poor weather conditions”
The PGHM had been alerted on Saturday for “three roped parties lost not far from the summit of Mont Blanc in very poor weather conditions”. Significant resources had been deployed on Sunday to recover two Koreans at an altitude of 4,100 m, not far from the Col de la Brenva. One of them had been hospitalized with hypothermia, the other had escaped unharmed, according to France 3 Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes.
However, the worsening weather conditions had prevented the rescuers from reaching the other two roped parties. They were only able to resume the search on Tuesday, taking advantage of a favorable weather window. The two roped parties were located “very quickly”, the commander of the Chamonix PGHM told France 3, with the rescuers having “a good idea of where (the climbers) could be”.
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