BERCHTESGADEN, Germany -- International rescuers pulled an injured German researcher up the final 590 feet of a vertical shaft in Germany's deepest cavern early Thursday, bringing an end to days of painstaking efforts to get him to the surface.
The researcher, Johann Westhauser, 52, had been exploring the depths of an alpine cavern near Berchtesgaden, in southern Germany, known as the Riesending, or Big Thing, on June 8 when he was struck on the head by a rock about 3,280 feet below the surface of Untersberg Mountain. A fellow explorer was able to journey back to the surface 12 hours later to alert the authorities, who launched a complex international rescue effort.
After 11 days, 10 hours and 40 minutes underground, Westhauser, strapped protectively to a stretcher, emerged. A chain of rescue workers passed him hand to hand along the final 300 feet to the surface, where he was quickly evaluated by waiting doctors before being flown by helicopter to a hospital.
"We have achieved our goal," Norbert Heiland, the head of Bavaria's Mountain Rescue Service, said at a news conference held in the Berchtesgaden fire station. "We have also made rescue history, which was only possible through international cooperation."
The rocky, scrub-scarred surface of the nearly 6,000-foot mountain, where the cavern's narrow mouth opens in a vertical drop known as "the chimney," initially made it impossible for a helicopter to land. Supplies and equipment had to be lowered by cable until a landing pad could be cleared.
But solidarity among the men and women who ensure the safety of those who explore the Alps runs strong, and within days of Westhauser's accident, hundreds of rescue workers began arriving from Austria, Switzerland, Italy and Croatia. Many were spelunkers themselves, a tight-knit group of expert climbers who descend into the inner depths of mountains.
"For years our solidarity has grown," said Roberto Corti, of the Italian National Society of Alpine Speleology. "We have worked together and gotten to know each other. Today we have the proof that this is the right way to work. We overcame language and technical barriers and succeeded in completing a difficult operation."
By the end, 202 workers descended into the cave to help in an effort that involved carrying him, strapped in a padded fiberglass stretcher, by hand and winching him by pulley through the inky darkness of the cavern, deep in the mountain near Germany's border with Austria.
"They really worked hard. They brought their best," said Klemens Reindl, who led the effort, which involved 728 people. "The best cavern rescue teams gathered here."
Five shelters equipped with sleeping bags, food and other supplies were set up at intervals inside the cavern, which stretches in an L-shape below the rocky surface.
"A difficult rescue effort like this can always fail," Reindl said. "It is essential that we work together." Westhauser remained conscious and able to communicate with his rescuers throughout the arduous ascent to the surface.
Among the biggest challenges rescuers faced were trying to pace themselves and not strain Westhauser, Reindl said. They had to guess how long it would take to reach each bivouac along the way and pace themselves accordingly.
After reaching the final bivouac, Reindl said, they stopped to rest and refocus, knowing that calm discipline was essential to the task. Although Westhauser had been accompanied by a doctor from Italy, who is also a mountain climber, in the final days of his rescue, the rescuers feared that a sudden burst of euphoria after the tension of the journey could endanger his health.
Late Thursday morning, Westhauser, his eyes covered with protective glasses to shield them from the sunlight, was lifted to safety through the final, narrow shaft to the surface. He was treated by teams of doctors who set up an emergency medical station in containers near the mouth of the cave, then taken to the hospital.
The Riesending cave, north of Berchtesgaden, stretches more than 12 miles, cutting vertically and horizontally into the mountain. Westhauser, who works in the physics department of the Karlsruhe Institute for Technology, is one of Germany's most experienced cave researchers. He has explored the Riesending cave several times since he discovered it in the mid-1990s as part of a team and helped map it in 2002.
A Section on 06/20/2014