They turned back short of the summit because of safety concerns, but their timing was unlucky. Dahlmeier was rappelling when a big rock fatally struck her.

A government spokesman in Pakistan says that German biathlon champion Laura Dahlmeier has died on a mountain in northern Pakistan.

Laura Dahlmeier, a retired Olympic biathlete from Germany, is presumed dead as a rescue operation to find her was called off after she had a high-elevation mountaineering accident in Pakistan on Monday. She was 31 years old.