A German team consisting of Günther Nothdurft and Franz Mayer, starting after the Italians, caught up with Corti and Longhi on the Face and climbed alongside them for multiple days, even briefly joining them on a common rope.
Despite generally suitable weather conditions, and though Nothdurft had previously set several speed records in the Alps, both parties climbed unusually slowly, spending at least five bivouacs together on the Face.
According to Corti, the Germans had lost a rucksack containing critical equipment near the beginning of their climb but had nevertheless elected to continue, and Nothdurft later became weak with illness and had to be cared for by Mayer, which severely hampered both teams' progress.
He could not produce a coherent story about what happened on the Face, and this, coupled with a sensationalistic press campaign and the opinions expressed by Heinrich Harrer in The White Spider, created an atmosphere of deep suspicion around him.
However, he was completely cleared when the dead Germans' bodies were found in 1961 on the opposite side of the mountain, on the normal route of descent along the West Flank, apparently the victims of an avalanche.