Alex Trelinski
A YOUNG climber was rescued on Friday after he went missing for four days on the Picos de Europa in Cantabria.
Senen Turienzo, 23, from Leon was scheduled to to finish his journey between Bejes and Covadonga on December 25.
He never arrived, so his brother Andres alerted emergency services.
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Senen was found in the Jou de los Boches, in the Eastern Massif, after being rescuers heard him respond to their shouts.
He had suffered a heavy fall but survived by being able to sleep between some rocks.
Senen had a head trauma, various contusions and fractures of the upper limbs.
He is recovering at the Central University Hospital of Asturias in Huca after being taken there by helicopter.
“He was saved by the desire to live that a 23-year-old boy has,” said helicopter crew member, Javier Odriozola, who relayed the good news to Senen’s parents who were waiting at the operation command post.
“Picos is immense, people can’t even imagine it and it was like looking for a grain of sand in the desert,” Odriozola added.
The last person to see Senen before he vanished was a ranger, Enrique Gonzalez, who according to El Diario de Cantabria spoke to him last Saturday: “We greeted each other. I asked him where he was from.”
“He told me that it was from Leon and he was going to go up to the Valdominguero Peak and that he then had plans to go down the Jidiellu Channel.”
Gonzalez added that Senen was not wearing the appropriate equipment for the expedition.
The emergency services of Cantabria and Asturias activated a search operation on Christmas Day and extra personnel were deployed two days later due to the difficulty of the terrain.
The Cantabria government on Thursday requested the requested the deployment of UME emergency troops but that was denied based on the fact that sufficient numbers were already involved in the search and rescue operation.
The Asturias government is said to be preparing a report on what happened and is not ruling out sending a bill to the climber.
There has been no comment on that score from their Cantabria counterparts.
