DNA testing identified the Belgian men after a hiker found their remains on the Trift Glacier in Valais in July.
SAAS-GRUND, Switzerland — DNA testing has identified remains recovered from the Trift Glacier as those of two Belgian mountaineers who disappeared in the Swiss Alps in 1992, ending a decades-old mystery after melting ice exposed the bodies this summer, authorities in Valais said.
A hiker reported finding the remains on July 26 on the glacier in the municipality of Saas-Grund, in southwestern Switzerland. A recovery operation was organized that day, and the remains were taken to the Institute of Forensic Medicine at Valais Hospital in Sion. Valais cantonal police announced Aug. 19 that a direct comparison of DNA profiles had established that the remains belonged to the two mountaineers missing from the Weissmies region since 1992.
The Belgian men were 39 and 41 when they disappeared. On Sept. 4, 1992, they left the Weissmies hut with plans to climb the Weissmies, a mountain rising 4,017 meters, or about 13,180 feet, and continue toward the Almagell hut. Severe weather disrupted the trip, and the men never reached their destination, according to the account released by Swiss authorities.
Search operations continued in the months after the disappearance. Searchers located a backpack but did not find the mountaineers. The case then remained unresolved for more than three decades, until the retreating ice exposed the remains this summer and gave investigators material that could be compared through DNA testing.
Valais police have maintained records of missing people since 1925, with many cases involving people who disappeared in high mountain areas or in rivers and other bodies of water. Police said the retreat of glaciers sometimes brings to the surface the remains of people who vanished in the mountains decades earlier.
The discovery comes during another severe year for Switzerland’s glaciers. Glacier Monitoring in Switzerland, known as GLAMOS, reported that the country’s glaciers had exhausted their protective winter snow reserves by June 29. Researchers said the 2026 melt pattern at that point was close to conditions seen in 2022, the worst year recorded for Swiss glacier loss. The early loss of snow leaves underlying glacier ice exposed to melting for a longer part of the summer.
The June 29 benchmark was the second-earliest so-called Glacier Loss Day on record, behind only 2022. Researchers have linked the accelerated retreat of Swiss glaciers to rising temperatures and repeated heat waves. Those national measurements describe the broader condition of glaciers across Switzerland and do not establish how much ice melted specifically around the remains found on the Trift Glacier.
Other long-running missing-person cases have also been resolved as Alpine ice has retreated. In 2023, DNA testing identified remains found near the Matterhorn as those of a German mountaineer who disappeared in 1986. Swiss reporting also said remains of a mountaineer missing since 1994 were found in 2025 on a glacier in the Ober Gabelhorn area of Valais.
The DNA results have now established the identities of the two Belgian mountaineers found in July, resolving the central question surrounding their disappearance after nearly 34 years. Valais authorities have not publicly released further details about the circumstances of their deaths beyond the severe weather reported during their 1992 trip.
Author note: Last updated August 23, 2026.