Two well-known Norwegian climbers died late last week in an apparent accident on Kjerag in southwestern Norway. Bjorn-Eivind Aartun and Stein-Ivan Gravdal were attempting to put up a new ice route on Kjerag’s 3,228-foot face. When they failed to return by Thursday, friends alerted emergency services. A helicopter found the partners hanging upside down from their rope, with blood visible on the cliff below them. Norway’s national climbing association said today that the deaths may have been caused by a loose chunk of snow or ice that fell and hit climbers. Investigators suspect that they fell between 160 and 200 feet. Artun and Gravdahl had both established other challenging routes on the wall, including Strandhogg and Pin-Up.
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