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You can find this article in the summer 2025 issue of the ÖKAS trade magazine analyse:berg. Become a subscriber to analyse:berg. You will receive the magazine conveniently delivered to your home as soon as it is published and support the work of ÖKAS at the same time.
“Hiking in Austria” is a fitting name, as mountain hiking is the most popular mountain sports discipline among locals and visitors alike. Because this section is exactly called hiking/mountaineering, everything that takes place on and off marked mountain hiking trails is evaluated here. There is no clear answer as to when hiking ends and mountaineering begins – but does not yet become climbing, via ferrata or alpine touring.
Observation period:
01.11.2023 until 31.10.2024
You can find out where the data comes from, how the recording works and which mountain sports disciplines are recorded in detail on the “Alpine accident statistics” page. The symbols used in the following graphics are explained in the legend.
Legend of the symbols used in the summer disciplines.
And because many people hike – unfortunately nobody knows exactly how many – and because it is a technically simple activity that supposedly anyone can do and which is advertised by an entire tourism industry, not only do many accidents happen here, but by far the most accidents of all summer mountain sports disciplines. With 1,691 injuries (10-year average: 1,430) and 120 fatalities (10-year average: 106), these are two unprecedented figures for the period under review. The fatal accident victims were and are Austrians, while Germans are just ahead in all accidents in the period under review – but Austrians are also the most frequently affected in the 10-year average. Another detail that is not really relevant, but interesting: at 770 to 657 on a 10-year average, more female hikers and mountaineers were injured in the current observation period, which is unusual. What is “normal”, however, is that many more of their male colleagues die in the process (87 to 20).
As in previous years, falling/stumbling/slipping is the number one cause of injury when hiking, with most people dying and continuing to die due to cardiovascular disorders. However, if the causes of falls/trips/slips and falls from a height are added together, 55 fatal accidents occur here on a 10-year average. This is 13 more than for cardiovascular disorders (42). In accident prevention, it is therefore important to take this fact into account and not just concentrate on the cardiovascular issue. The fact that many people are increasingly “forgetting how to walk” is feedback that we regularly receive from mountain guides and instructors …
For the sake of completeness: accidents during trail running also fall into this category.
Fig. 1: All hiking accidents (with uninjured, injured & fatalities) as well as accidents, uninjured, injured and fatalities by federal state in the 10-year average and in the period under review (Austria from 01.11.2023 to 31.10.2024).
Fig. 2: Accident victims (uninjured, injured & fatalities) of hikers by accident consequences in the 10-year average and in the period under review (Austria from 01.11.2023 to 31.10.2024)
Fig. 3: Uninjured, injured and dead hikers in the last 10 years and on average in Austria.
Fig. 4: Accident victims (uninjured, injured and fatalities) and uninjured, injured and fatal hikers by gender in the 10-year average and in the period under review (Austria from 01.11.2023 to 31.10.2024)
