Two Romanian mountaineers were found dead at the bottom of a crevasse on Italy's Gran Paradiso on Monday, ending a search that began when they failed to give any sign of life after leaving a refuge on 9 July.
The bodies were recovered from a crevasse at roughly 3,700 metres on the descent route, where the pair had fallen about 20 metres, the Valdostan Alpine Rescue service said. Formal identification has been entrusted to the financial police of Entrèves-Courmayeur.
The recovery caps a deadly stretch in the Alps. A separate incident on the Matterhorn's Swiss-side Hörnli ridge on Sunday killed two further climbers at about 4,030 metres; those victims have yet to be identified.