“The mountain world is affected” : Four mountaineers were buried in an avalanche above the Mont-Dore station (Puy-de-Dôme), Sunday February 26. Faced with this “tragedy”, Rescuers and mountain professionals unite around the victims and survivors.
“We are in the process of investigating the identity of the victims and their age”announced during a press point Sébastien Dubourg, the mayor of Mont-Dore, a ski resort in the Sancy massif, north of the Auvergne Volcanoes regional natural park, above which the ” drama “.
“Seasoned” people
Shortly before 1 p.m. on Sunday, an avalanche was triggered in the Val d’Enfer perched above the resort, at approximately 1,600 altitude. Seven climbers, including a guide, were progressing in an off-piste area when they “been caught in the flow” and buried. Four of them died, three others were slightly injured. They were then hospitalized.
” It’s a tragedy “described the prefecture explaining that the seven victims were roped up at the time of the avalanche and “were buried” by the sliding of the snow cover.
The group roped up at the time of the incident consisted of two other people who escaped the avalanche and raised the alarm, sub-prefect Judith Husson told AFP. In the group, “several of them had tags” which facilitated the research, according to the same source. “Given the equipment, we assume they were seasoned people”noted the mayor, himself a ski instructor, who recalled that “the mountains, even at low altitude, are dangerous”.
Call for caution
In the valley where the ” drama “, “50 centimeters of snow fell in four days, it’s a kind of funnel” off-piste, he described, also announcing that the station will remain open. “I have trackers who determine the risks in the morning if there is a need to trigger an avalanche” as a preventative measure, added the city councilor, “Afterwards, we can’t be everywhere off-piste”, he lamented. The avalanche was triggered on a day of heavy snow in the ski area with up to 60 centimeters of hard and compact snow depending on the altitude, according to the specialist site Ski Info.
“The mountain world is affected”, said Gendarmerie Lieutenant-Colonel Lenne, recalling that around fifty rescuers intervened following the report “from a snow slide” and worked to find the buried people until the end of the followingnoon. At 5:15 p.m., a few hours following the slide, the prefecture indicated that the search was over, all the climbers having been found.
Deputy Husson called for “be extremely careful regarding the rules in the mountains”recalling that the “tourists and even (THE) experienced people » must “be informed before you leave… You are never completely safe off-piste”.
In mid-January, the high mountain gendarmerie platoon (PGHM) called on mountaineers to be careful, following recovering a skier swept away by an avalanche in a different context. “Be careful despite the light snowfall, wind slabs are triggered and can cause avalanches”, warned its Facebook site. The Clermont-Ferrand public prosecutor’s office opened an investigation on Sunday to determine the causes of the accident.
