Brit tourist, 50, killed in paragliding accident close to 8,500ft-tall mountain peak in Spain
A BRITISH tourist was killed in a horror paragliding accident near an 8,500ft-tall mountain peak in Spain.
The 50-year-old’s body was taken away by a police helicopter after an incident on the south side of a peak called Pico Gallinero in the Aragonese Pyrenees.
Civil Guard was alerted around 1.30 pm on Thursday and officers from the Greim mountain rescue team responded while a police chopper was mobilised.
They are said to have discovered another two people practising CPR on the unnamed Brit when they reached the scene, but he died due to the severity of his injuries.
The causes of the accident are now under investigation.
The mountain peak is not far from the spot where British hiker Esther Dingley was found dead last year following her disappearance.
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Esther, 37, is believed to have fallen after slipping in worn walking shoes without spikes.
The Oxford graduate attempted a solo hike from Spain into France on the mountain range in November 2020.
The same mountain rescue team based in the Pyrenees town of Benasque that took part in the search for Esther participated in Thursday's operation.
The dead man’s body is now at Huesca’s Provincial Hospital and a post-mortem is expected to take place within the next 48 hours.
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The south side of Gallinero Peak, which is in the municipality of Castejon de Sos, is believed to be a take-off site for paragliders wanting to enjoy spectacular views of the Pyrenees including Spain’s third-highest mountain Aneto.
In June a 52-year-old man from Barcelona lost his life in an earlier paragliding tragedy in virtually the same spot.
Reports at the time linked the tragedy to a possible human error.