Climbers Nearly Swept Off Aconcagua in Gnarly Landslide

Hiking

by Albie Hartshill Jan 25, 2016

IF YOU ARE A GUIDE, AND YOU see a tiny landslide in progress, you might think, “No big deal. I can still help my guests across the landslide.” But as this video shows, it might be a good idea to try and resist that impulse. The video, which takes place at Aconcagua Provincial Park, shows guides helping their guests across the landslide, only to dive out of the way as an even more massive landslide barrels down the side of the mountain.

The text in the video reads (according to Google Translate) as this:

“Avalanche between Horcones (park entrance) and Confluence (first base camp of the Aconcagua field). Julian Insarralde [who posted the video], Nico Aguero and Naco Choulet were working for INOUT ADVENTURE. During a trek lasting three days. We are going to customers to avoid them being splashed with mud as it is an area of avalanches at that time of year. The warning was a sound similar to an airplane sound, which is why Julian Insarralde is looking back and is able to warn that an avalanche is coming. That’s why we ran and we did not abandon people so that we were in the safe zone. They are things that can happen when we work in real natural environments”.

Don’t try to cross in-progress landslides, guys. It could’ve ended much, much worse.