Ukrainian journalist died climbing Mkinvartsveri

Syvokon with his wife (Facebook)

Tbilisi, DFWatch – The Ukrainian journalist, Pavlo Syvokon, 32, died in the Caucasus mountains near the townlet of Stepantsminda while climbing Mount Kazbeg, or Mkinvartsveri in Georgian (5,047  m ).

According to the other climbers, who found him and called for the emergency service, he was an amateur mountaineer and fell in a 25 meter dep cleft. He was already dead by the time rescuers recovered him from the cleft.

The incident happened on Thursday morning.

This is the first case, when a tourist died while climbing Mkinvartsveri this year. Fatal cases are however reported every year given foreign mountaineers’, whether professional or amateur, high interest in climbing the Caucasus.

A spokeperson for the Emergency Service told DF Watch on that the rescuers brought the body to Tbilisi on Friday.

“You have to follow certain rules while climbing, take into account different factors, and pay attention to equipment. As other climbers told us, he didn’t have proper equipment,” the spokesperson remarked.

The employees of the Emergency Service didn’t have information whether the tourist was climbing alone or with anyone else and specifically what rules he violated during climbing.

The wife of the victim, Natalya Huzenko, also a journalist, is in Tbilisi too. She wrote on her Facebook profile that she was now taking care of the necessary documents to bring the body of her husband to Ukraine.