Webcam images have shown how a woman was left to die on Austria’s biggest mountain after being abandoned by her experienced climber boyfriend.
The 33-year-old mountaineer from Salzburg died on the 12,460ft Grossglockner mountain in January after setting off on a tour with her partner, 36.
When they were just 165ft (50m) from the summit, the woman began to struggle and was unable to continue, reports Heute.
The man then allegedly left his girlfriend alone on the mountain for 6.5 hours to get help. But during this time, the extreme cold claimed her life.
Webcam images shared in local media clearly shows the emergency lights of the two alpinists during their ascent glowing at 6pm on January 18. Just six hours later, the lights began to dim with low battery, and the woman’s strength gave out.
An image captured at around 2.30am showed the boyfriend pushing on alone to descend to the other side of the Grossglocker, after leaving behind his partner in the freezing snow with little equipment.
At 7.10am webcam footage captured a helicopter soaring over the mountain, but the rescue mission had to be aborted due to strong winds.
Just under three hours later, six rescuers were seen during their ascent, but the woman was tragically dead upon their arrival.
With the investigation into the woman’s death now complete, the boyfriend, who was an experienced climber, has been charged with manslaughter by gross negligence and is facing up to three years in prison.
‘At approximately 2am, the defendant left his girlfriend unprotected, exhausted, hypothermic, and disoriented about 50 meters below the summit cross of the Großglockner,’ said a statement from the public prosecutor’s office.
‘The woman froze to death. Since the defendant, unlike his girlfriend, was already very experienced with alpine high-altitude tours and had planned the tour, he was to be considered the responsible guide of the tour.’
After obtaining forensic reports, evaluating mobile phones, sports watches, pictures and videos, and an assessment by an alpine technical expert, the public prosecutor’s office has accused the mountaineer of several errors.
The 36-year-old allegedly did not take into account that his girlfriend was highly inexperienced and had never undertaken an alpine high-altitude tour of this length.
He was also accused of starting the tour around two hours later than scheduled, while not carrying any sufficient emergency equipment.
Even when he had left his partner to get help, he allegedly did not bring her to a wind-protected place and did not use a bivouac sack or aluminum rescue blankets.
The boyfriend had also allowed his girlfriend to ascend the mountain with a splitboard and soft snow boots – equipment which is deemed unsuitable among mountaineers for a high-alpine tour in mixed terrain.
Given the harsh weather conditions with wind speeds of up to 46mph and temperatures of minus eight degrees – which felt like minus 20 degrees when combined – the defendant should have turned back earlier, according to the public prosecutor.
Despite the severity of his girlfriend’s situation, the man has also been accused of failing to make an emergency call before nightfall.
The defendant and his girlfriend were stranded from around 8.50pm, he allegedly did not give any distress signals when a police helicopter flew over at 10.50pm.
After several attempts by the Alpine Police to contact the boyfriend, he finally spoke to an officer at around 00.35am.
Although the content of the conversation remained unclear, the defendant did not contact the rescue services again following the conversation.
He had put his phone on silent and put it away, and therefore did not receive any further calls from the Alpine Police, according to the German news outlet.
Kurt Jelinek, the boyfriend’s lawyer, said in a statement to the KUIER: ‘My client is very sorry about how things turned out.’
However, the defense attorney ‘still assumes it was a tragic, fateful accident’.
The boyfriend’s trial is set to take place on February 19, 2026, at the Innsbruck Regional Court.
