The last adventure of the gang that lived for the sake of the mountain | Spain

They lived in the mountains, and there they found death. Three members of a group of climbing enthusiasts died on Wednesday after an accident in a river pass in northeastern Switzerland; A fourth member is still missing. The expedition was surprised by a severe storm when it was in a valley in the town of Wattis in the canton of St. Gallen. Police investigations indicate that the water pipe was dragging it between large quantities of water and stones in some canyons, where the level of riverbeds doubles when a storm occurs. Only two women were rescued, and they decided not to continue that afternoon. And they warned that their owners did not return.

The relationship between these friends and the mountain came from afar. Their experience took them across peaks, valleys, cliffs and tunnels in pristine rocks across Europe. This is why a guide did not accompany them. That’s why the news affected so much in their places of origin. Flags of the city council of Allo, a town in southern Navarra of about a thousand people, are tied with black crepe: one of the deceased, Mikel Lhasa, and the disappeared, Diego Mizto, is there. Lhasa, 33, used to work at a gas station and now work in the fields. Meizto, 38, was an employee of a steel plant in Moretta. Paula, a neighbor, recounts that a female survivor was Mezzo’s partner and highlights how the gang “ran” when she could, heading to any slope in their truck: “They were nature-loving adventurers.”

The waitress in a nearby bar knows what happened “a very hard blow to the people”. “They are young men we treat every day, and that has caused us terrible pain,” he adds. The group’s favorite destination was the Huesca Canyons, and they took advantage of the summer to head out into the Central European mountain ranges, a challenge for those who founded the Cave Society in Allo a couple of years ago. The complex terrain and bad weather in the area near Lake Geigerwald, the point where these sudden canyons ended, caused rescuers – as many as 100 soldiers with dogs, drones, divers, and mountain specialists – to not find the missing person and it would lead to It takes several hours to locate dead bodies after washing with water. The search for Mezzo seems difficult, according to sources close to his family, because “four or six meters from the waterfall and a lot of mud fell on it.” A melancholy tone also in a bar at Allo: “They both have started independence and stabilization for their partner.” The city council issued a decree of mourning for a period of seven days. Just listen to the mayor, Susanna Castnera: “Today we are not of any political party. We are all one.”

With tears in his eyes, Javier Monares adds that his friends Diego and Mikel, with whom he has been hiking for 15 years, “loved the valleys, they were their true passion.” He describes the tragedy area as “a place with a high percentage of water for rowing with a lot of attraction for the sport.”

The ordeal also overshadows Ohart Arakel, a town in Navarra with 800 neighbors at the foot of the Aralar mountain range. Mikel Zbalza, one of the accident victims, was 30 on August 15th. The mother of one of his friends recounts that he was “a canyon player from a young age”. Zabalza, United in mountaineeringHe worked in a foundry in Salvatierra (Alava) and his passion for adventure led him all over the world, with France as his usual destination.

The third death was called Andoni Gonzalez, and he was 48 years old and lived in Guinness (Bizkaya, 6000). Nature united this group, who uploaded images of stunning landscapes to their social networks such as snowy peaks, crosses between rocks with belts, and a cliff lit only by the light of their helmets or meadows above sea level. They founded Kat-Team, a group that brought together those friends who alone are Mountain. One of his friends asserts that “they were highly qualified people in the world of valleys and mountains.” Flag that wild cat observing the climber’s shadow in mourning.