Col di Lana
Peak · 2452 m · Dolomites
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Italian and Austro-Hungarian troops fought for months over Col di Lana's 2,452 m summit during the First World War, earning it the name Col di Sangue, Hill of Blood. On 17 April 1916 Italian engineers detonated five tons of dynamite in a tunnel dug beneath the peak, blowing away the summit and killing nearly every Austrian defender still holding it. The crater remains visible, crossed today by the Sentiero Storico del Col di Lana.
Col di Lana's summit is built of dark volcaniclastic sandstone laid down by undersea volcanic activity in the Middle Triassic, softer than the pale dolomite of the Fanes peaks around it. Italy's war ministry recorded 2,495 dead and 1,018 missing or captured in the fighting for the mountain; counting the wounded, total losses approached 12,000, against roughly 1,600 Austro-Hungarian and German dead. Barracks foundations and decaying gun and communications trenches still line the approach, and a small museum near the summit displays relics from the fighting. Some 70,000 Italian troops rotated through the sector across three years of war for control of the mountain.
What you see
A small wooden chapel stands alone on the bare summit, the only structure at the top.
Practical
The shortest way up is on foot from Passo Valparola (2,168 m): trail markers 21 and 23 climb about 284 m via Passo Sief and Cima Sief, with fixed cables easing the final scramble to the summit cross.
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