Capanna Regina Margherita
| Capanna Regina Margherita CAI Hut Category E |
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| location | The peak of the Signalkuppe (Punta Gnifetti); Vercelli Province , Italy | |
| Mountain range | Valais Alps | |
| Geographical location: | 45 ° 55 '38 " N , 7 ° 52' 37" E | |
| Altitude | 4554 m slm | |
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| owner | CAI - Varallo Section | |
| Built | 1893 | |
| Construction type | hut | |
| Usual opening times | Mid-June to mid-September | |
| accommodation | 0 beds, 55 camps , 15 emergency camps | |
| Winter room | 12 bearings | |
| Web link | official homepage | |
| Hut directory | SAC | |
The Capanna Regina Margherita , German Margheritahütte , is a refuge on the Signalkuppe in the Monte Rosa massif of the Valais Alps in Italy . The border with Switzerland runs a few meters west of the hut. The building is located in the municipality of Macugnaga (Walser German: Magganaa).
It lies at an altitude of 4554 m slm , making it the highest building in Europe. The hut is owned by the Varallo section of the Club Alpino Italiano (CAI), is open from mid-June to mid-September, and during this time it can accommodate 70 mountaineers. The winter room with 12 camps is open for the rest of the year . An international center for altitude physiological research is located in the hut. Over the years there has been cooperation between many research groups in clinical and theoretical medicine from the universities of Zurich, Bern, Lausanne, Innsbruck and Heidelberg.
Approaches
The approaches correspond to the routes on the Signal summit. These are always glacier tours that require appropriate equipment and caution. From the Italian side, the easiest way to get to the hut is to take a four-hour ascent over the Capanna Giovanni Gnifetti at an altitude of 3647 m .
The Capanna Regina Margherita serves as a starting point to the summits of the Zumsteinspitze , the Dufourspitze , the Nordend and the east and west summits of the Liskamm .
history
On July 14, 1889, a delegates' meeting of the CAI decided to build a mountaineering accommodation and research station at an altitude of over 4500 m . Due to the need for a relatively short access and safety from avalanches, Mont Blanc ( 4810 m ), Dufourspitze ( 4634 m above sea level ) and Matterhorn ( 4478 m ), among others, were excluded as locations. The construction of the first hut on Signalkuppe began in 1890 with blasting work. The 35 square meter building made of pitch pine was built by Benedetto Pfetterich in Biella , then moved to Gressoney-Saint-Jean in 1891 and temporarily assembled. This was followed by the name baptism by Queen Margaret of Italy . In autumn, the individual parts were transported up to Hochliecht at 3140 m . Before the final assembly was carried out in 1893, the approximately ten tons of building material were transported to the foot of the summit flank in the summer of 1892. During the construction, the hut was anchored in the rock and provided with a copper cladding to protect against lightning. On August 18, 1893, the Queen climbed the summit of the Signalkuppe and spent the night in the hut. The official opening finally took place on September 4th. The cost at the time was 17,094.55 lire .
At that time, the main focus was on scientific use. After the 5th International Physiological Congress in Turin in 1901 had decided to found an international physiological laboratory in the Alps, the hut was expanded in 1903 under the direction of Angelo Mosso and given its new purpose on August 14th. It now consisted of seven rooms and a terrace for outdoor observation. In the same year Nathan Zuntz from Berlin and Arnold Durig from Vienna studied the influence of the high altitude climate on the human organism for three weeks.
In 1980 today's modern hut was built. Like its predecessor, the three-story, double-walled timber structure is provided with a copper jacket. As a result, the hut is shielded against electrical fields, such as those that occur in the event of lightning strikes, according to the Faraday cage principle . The hut is supplied with helicopters, there is no material ropeway. A snow melting system is available for water production for commercial purposes, there is no water supply for sanitary requirements. The mountain hut is still home to scientific facilities for altitude medical experiments and an observatory .
Web links
- Peter Bärtsch: Medical research in the high mountains. In: Research magazine Ruperto Carola of the University of Heidelberg , No. 3, 1995.
- Queen Margherita Observatory and Hut, Monte Rosa, Italy. Portal Copper Concept (many images, English)
Individual evidence
- ^ Daniel Anker, Marco Volken: Monte Rosa - Queen of the Alps. AS Verlag, Zurich 2009, ISBN 978-3-909111-68-8 , p. 262 ff.
- ^ A. Mosso: The international physiological laboratory on Monte Rosa. In: The look around. 8, 1904, pp. 5-9.