A night-time helicopter search for pic du Midi d'Ossau ended with an unexpected encounter near a parking lot
On Friday around 11 p.m., rescuers received an alarming message from Spanish tourists. The couple met a lone hiker on the classic route to the summit pic du Midi d'Ossau, but did not see him again during the descent and noticed that the guy's car was still parked in the parking lot.
A large-scale rescue operation was launched to search for the missing person. Three rescuers, a doctor and a helicopter Dragon 64 were involved in checking the slopes, which conducted an aerial reconnaissance in the dark along the entire usual route and nearby sectors. The night search did not yield any results, but on Saturday morning a gendarmerie patrol met the tourist right next to his car. It turned out that he had safely spent the night right on the mountain peak.