According to the mountain rescue service, two men who were only wearing sneakers and jogging pants were rescued in wintry conditions below the Zugspitze. The two young men tried to climb Germany’s highest peak via the Reintal on Tuesday, the Garmisch-Partenkirchen mountain rescue service said on Wednesday. At the height of the Knorrhütte (2051 meters) the two blocked around 3 p.m. due to the snow and low temperatures and then asked for help.
Two mountain rescue teams brought the men, who reportedly came from the Netherlands, back to the valley with the help of a police helicopter “in turbulent wind conditions”. The police were initially unable to provide precise information about the age of the two men, who were ultimately exhausted and hypothermic. The Alpine police task force is now checking whether they have to pay for the operation.
The route via the Reintal is considered the longest but least demanding route to the Zugspitze in terms of mountaineering. But in the Bavarian mountains there are currently wintry conditions at higher altitudes with deep snow and sub-zero temperatures at times. On Wednesday, too, the Zugspitze summit was surrounded by a thick flurry of snow with temperatures well below freezing.
The Bavarian mountain rescue service has to go out on similar missions again and again because mountaineers are poorly equipped or in unsuitable weather conditions.