Published: Less than 10 minutes ago
Two more deaths have been confirmed after the great glacier landslide that occurred in the Italian Dolomites on Sunday. The death toll is thus written to nine – while three people are still missing, Italian media report.
A huge amount of ice, snow and rock came loose from the Punta rocca glacier (roughly Konspetsen) on the mountain top Marmolada in northeastern Italy, after the temperatures at an altitude of 3,000 meters rose to up to ten plus degrees.
Climbing groups and hikers were involved, but during the first days it was uncertain how many there were. At one point, 30 people were reported to have disappeared, but many of them have recovered.
The unusually warm weather also makes it difficult to search the melting glacier. Drones are used to find individual tracks or remains. Given the enormous forces of nature, victims are assumed to be able to lie packed deep in the snow, or be really hard-pressed.