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Evening Standard
Evening Standard
World
Natalia Penza

Brit, 50, dies in paragliding accident in the Pyrenees mountains

Men walk on a hiking trail at the Col de La Pique, in the French Pyrenees near the border with Spain

(Picture: AFP via Getty Images)

A British man has died in a paragliding accident in Spain.

The 50-year-old’s body was taken away by a police helicopter after an incident on the south side of a 8,572ft mountain peak called Pico Gallinero in the Aragonese Pyrenees.

Civil Guard were alerted at roughly 1.30pm 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 practicing 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 November 2020 disappearance.

The same mountain rescue team based in the Pyrenees town of Benasque that took part in the search for the Oxford graduate, 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.

The south side of the 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.

A local firm which organises flights says online that “it’s a unique setting for a magical experience.”

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.

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