Climber Convicted of Manslaughter After Abandoning (2nd) Girlfriend on Mountain Peak

Imagine for a moment that you and your romantic partner, both passionate mountain climbers, are attempting an ascent of the highest mountain in the Alps, Austria’s mighty Großglockner (Glockner). There’s an obvious degree of risk inherent to such a dangerous adventure—more than 8,000 accidents occur in Austria’s mountains on a yearly basis, and almost 300 deaths. Perhaps you and your beau might have a little talk in advance about how you’d handle an emergency situation, should hard decisions need to be made. But it’s hard to imagine your go-to plan would be “just leave me at the top of the mountain and save yourself.” Especially if you knew that your boyfriend had already abandoned another girlfriend on the very same mountain, two years earlier.

Sadly, that’s what apparently played out between a couple who were attempting to climb Glockner in January 2025—and the fact that the girlfriend did not survive ultimately led to a just-concluded trial for manslaughter. Defendant Thomas P (Austrian courts anonymize names) was convicted of gross negligence manslaughter for leaving girlfriend Kerstin G behind near the Glockner summit, only hours after he had told potential rescuers that they were fine and that no rescue would be necessary. For that, the man received what can only be described as a slap on the wrist for directly causing this woman’s death, in the form of a five-month suspended sentence and a fine of €9,400 (approximately $11,000). The maximum prison term for the crime would have been three years.

You’d think the testimony from Thomas P’s former girlfriend, who was called as a witness, would have weighed more heavily on the sentence handed down by Judge Norbert Hofer. According to The Guardian, she testified during the trial that she had also climbed Glockner with Thomas P in 2023, and that he had the gall to abandon her as well “on the route at night after her head torch ran out of battery, leaving her distressed.” In what might register as one of the grandest understatements ever written, she said, “So that was the last mountain expedition we undertook together.” One would think the rate of relationships that survive being abandoned by your partner on a mountain would be notably low.

That Austrian climber has been found guilty

A former girlfriend of his testified that he also left her alone while hiking the same mountain 👀

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article…

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— Tits McGee (@scientits.bsky.social) Feb 20, 2026 at 5:43 AM

The defense for Thomas P, meanwhile, argued that the entire affair was a tragic accident and that he was “endlessly sorry about what happened, and how it happened.” He told the court that Kerstin had instructed him to go it alone, saying, “Go, go on your own and save your own life.” Incredibly, even the mother of Kerstin G seemed to take his side to some degree, seemingly reacting with anger not about her daughter’s abandonment and death, but with the media portrayal that Kerstin had been a weaker climber or athlete than her boyfriend. Testifying to the court via written statement, Kerstin’s mother, Gertrud G, said that her daughter “would not have gone along blindly” with her boyfriend into a deadly situation, and disputed the idea that Kerstin was a victim.

“Our daughter takes responsibility for her own actions, we can’t blame her boyfriend,” her parents wrote. “She did mountain runs and summited mountains far more difficult than this one.”

With that said, Thomas P’s behavior leading up to the abandonment raised some eyebrows—no doubt contributing to his manslaughter conviction. Only two hours earlier, Thomas had apparently been contacted by a police officer on his cell, after a helicopter was sent out to monitor the couple’s ascent amid concerns for their safety. According to the officer, who testified in the trial, Thomas told him that there was no need for assistance or rescue, saying, “We don’t need anything … everything’s fine.”

Two hours later, near the summit, with Kerstin suffering from hypothermia and exhaustion, and apparently viral pneumonia as well, Thomas decided to descend the mountain, ostensibly in search of help. It’s a scenario that would be deeply sympathetic with only a few tweaks, and yet details like the following keep cropping up: “He said he had left Kerstin G on a ridge exposed to strong winds when he went to seek help. He told the court he could not explain why he had failed to wrap her in the emergency blanket she was carrying or place her in a bivouac bag. When her body was later recovered, the items were found in her rucksack.”

I mean, really: If you were a man who had once been through a decidedly negative climbing experience where you abandoned your girlfriend on a mountain, would you really climb the same mountain with another girlfriend? And would you not be extremely sensitive about the prospect of abandoning another woman in the exact same place? Or would you feel fine about it, considering that the apparent punishment is just to receive a suspended sentence and admonition not to do it a third time?

Can we preemptively agree that if this guy abandons another woman on a mountain in his remaining years, that he will be summarily thrown off one?