A Danish hiker died on Wednesday in the Mont Blanc massif in the French Alps after slipping off a trail, rescue services said, just a day after four climbers were found dead on the iconic peak.
The 61-year-old man was walking in a steep area near Saint-Gervais-les-Bains in the Haute-Savoie department in eastern France when he fell about 30 metres, authorities said.
The fall killed the man instantly, said the Chamonix PGHM.
Wednesday’s deaths come a day after four climbers, two Koreans and two Italians, died. found dead on Mont Blanc himself after being stuck on the highest peak in the Alps for days due to harsh weather.
The four climbers “died of exhaustion,” the Haute-Savoie prefecture told AFP.
A senior PHGM official told regional daily Le Dauphiné Libéré that they had briefly reached the Italian climbers by phone and obtained their position at 4,600 metres on the north face of Mont Blanc, but the connection had been cut off.
At 4,809 metres above sea level, Mont Blanc is the highest peak in Western Europe and is popular with climbers from all over the world. However, climbing this mountain is risky.
In 2022, a French mayor said conditions on Mont Blanc were so dangerous that climbers had to pay a €15,000 deposit to cover rescue and funeral costs, the BBC reported. At the time, Jean-Marc Peillex, the mayor of Saint-Gervais, criticized “pseudo-climbers” who insisted on attempting the climb “with death in their backpacks.”
