Via ferrata

Is via ferrata safe?

Mostly, if you stay clipped in. A via ferrata, an iron way up a rock face with steel cables, rungs and ladders, lets people without climbing skills reach steep terrain. The safety system works: clipped in with a proper set, a fall usually ends in bruises or a broken ankle. Deaths in the Austrian Alps come mainly from climbers who were not clipped in, from heart problems, and occasionally from broken equipment.

How likely is it to kill you? Here the honest answer is that nobody knows precisely. Austria counts its dead carefully, 16 on via ferratas in 2024 against a 10-year average of 15, according to the Austrian Board for Alpine Safety (ÖKAS). But no one counts how many people climb or for how long. The German Alpine Club has estimated 1 death per 10 million hours, about 0.1 micromortsMicromortA one-in-a-million chance of death. It lets you compare the risk of very different activities on one scale.More in the glossary per hour. Austrian researchers used that rate to suggest 40 to 62 million via ferrata hours a year in Austria; set against the higher recent death count, the rate is closer to 0.3 per hour. For a 3 to 5 hour route that gives roughly 0.5 to 2 micromorts, comparable to a day of hiking in the Alps and well below an hour of rock climbing.

How people die on via ferratas

The best data come from Austria's police registry, analysed by researchers from Innsbruck for 2008 to 2018. In those 11 years, 1,684 people needed rescue on via ferratas and 62 died, 51 of them men.

• Unclipped falls caused 26 of the 62 deaths. Climbers who did not use a set, or unclipped on a section that looked easy, fell to the ground.
• The easiest routes were the deadliest. On grade A routes, 13% of people in emergencies died, against 3.7% overall. In 90% of grade A deaths the climber was not using safety equipment. Traverses and descents were where unclipped climbers most often fell.
• Medical emergencies caused 7 deaths, and in two cases a cardiac arrest caused a fall. Climbing a via ferrata is hard, sustained work for an unfit heart.
• Equipment failure caused 4 deaths from only 6 emergencies, the most lethal cause in the data.

Lightning was a cause in 18 emergencies, with injuries but no deaths. Rockfall caused 37 emergencies, also without deaths.

Switzerland's Alpine Club publishes detailed mountain-rescue statistics but does not list via ferrata deaths separately in its 2025 report, so we cannot give a Swiss rate.

The lanyard recalls of 2012 and 2013

The weak point of the system used to be the set itself. After a fatal accident in 2012, tests showed that worn elastic lanyards from several makers might not hold a fall. In August and September 2012, sets with elastic arms were recalled. In February 2013 a second recall followed for older sets that used rope-friction brakes. The UIAA, the international climbing federation, listed the affected models and gave a clear rule: a via ferrata set must be thrown away after one fall, and at the end of the maker's lifespan.

Modern sets use energy absorbers that tear in a controlled way. They are tested to a European standard, EN 958, that was revised after the recalls. A secondhand or old set of unknown history is not worth the saving.

Most rescues are for tired climbers

Most rescues are not for injuries. In Austria, 57% of people rescued from via ferratas were uninjured. Exhaustion was the cause in 42% of emergencies, and another 17% were blocked or lost. Most of these happened on the hard routes (grades C and D), where people overestimated their fitness or arm strength and could go neither up nor down.

A rescue from a cliff usually means a helicopter. Being stuck also carries its own risks: cold, falling darkness and storms rolling in.

How to climb a via ferrata more safely

1. Use a current via ferrata set to EN 958, plus a climbing harness and helmet. Check the date and weight range, and replace it after any fall.
2. Clip both carabiners to the cable at all times, and move them one at a time at every anchor. Easy sections and traverses are where unclipped climbers die.
3. Pick a route by its grade and length. Start with A or B routes, and move to C, D and E once you know your strength. Vertical sections take far more arm power than people expect.
4. Start early and check the thunderstorm forecast. Have an escape point in mind and get away from the cable if a storm comes in.
5. Keep distance from the person ahead: only one climber between two anchors, so a fall does not take someone else with it.
6. Know your heart. If you have chest pain, unusual breathlessness or known heart disease, talk to your doctor before a long, steep route.
7. Save the rescue number (140 in Austria, 1414 for Rega in Switzerland, 112 elsewhere) and carry a charged phone.

How we scored it

Fatality risk (80) is our estimate of roughly 0.5 to 2 micromortsMicromortA one-in-a-million chance of death. It lets you compare the risk of very different activities on one scale.More in the glossary per route, uncertain because nobody measures how many people climb. Serious injury risk (78) is moderate. Controllability (72) is good, since most deaths involve not being clipped in. Rescue and environment (50) is the weakest factor: steep, exposed faces, storms and helicopter-only rescues.