The Santa Cruz city of El Chalten transits “a record season in number of visitors“, but a month and a half after the end of the high tourist season, the authorities also mourned the death of five climbers and mountaineers.
“The reality is that it is a record season in terms of the number of visitors, so everything depends on that number, accidents, thefts, saturation of the paths, of the campsites, of the bathrooms, of everything based on that number, are issues statistics,” said Jorge Lenz, manager of the North Zone of Los Glaciares National Park (PNLG), to Télam.
The official indicated that “many years ago” the mountain village had reached the number of “5 deaths in mountain accidents in one season, although in this case there is a month and a half left to finish the season” which runs until Easter.
Lenz estimated a visit that averages 10,000 people daily in the PNLGwhile the official and civil resources to attend that record number “are with a lot of physical effort this season.”
While “the weather conditions are changing a lot in the place, that makes the mountain change as well.”
“The avalanche accidents that occurred have to do with a commonly traveled place that, with the heat that is taking place throughout the month of January, presents other conditions,” he added.
Lenz affirmed that in general the climbers “are at their climbing level” while there are other cases of “people who should not have gotten into that place.”
“We have other daily accidents of fractures, sprains, bends in what we call the trunk network, because not all of them are mountaineers, out there they suddenly want to walk 20 kilometers and uneven more than a thousand meters,” he observed.
Lenz recommended, since El Chaltén is the national trekking capital“arrive prepared and informed” since “the climate is very varied”.
“You have to come with the right equipment and have a physical preparation or at least know the limitshe added.
The park ranger emphasized that “the mountain does not end at the summit or the walk at the end of the trail, but rather you have to return.”
Lenz reported that the PNLG has a plant of 27 people in the northern zone to receive visitors in 200,000 hectares.
“We are with a lot of physical effort this season,” he said while highlighting the permanent collaboration of a relief commission made up of volunteers.
“A high mountain rescue involves at least one and a half or two days, with a lot of physical effort, the companions are very tired and are not operational for one or two days,” he warned.
Marcos Gorostiaga (28), a resident doctor from Buenos Aires and based in San Carlos de Bariloche, died last Wednesday after a rock fell off and fell on his head while climbing “el Mochito” hill, in the valley of Cerro Torre.
His body was rescued with the help of a helicopter managed by the Provincial Directorate of Civil Protection, other sources reported.
Lenz explained that “due to the characteristics of the place, the helicopter sometimes cannot operate or even arrive due to weather conditions.”
The Swiss mountaineer and theologian Christoph Klein (48) died on December 19 in the sector of the Standhart Needle and the American Cassandra Doolittle (25) died on December 25 at the base of the Guillaumet Needle.
The Basques Iker Bilbao (29) and Amaia Agirre (31), died on January 19 when they fell into a crack more than 15 meters deep and were buried by an avalanche at the foot of Cerro Fitz Roy, a mountain 3,405 meters above the sea level, the main attraction of El Chalten.
