Official: Recovering fallen climbers too dangerous
Source: AP-Excite
By RACHEL LA CORTE and PHUONG LE
MOUNT RAINIER NATIONAL PARK, Wash. (AP) Rescuers likely know the final resting place of six climbers who set out last week to attempt one of the most technical and physically grueling routes to the peak of Mount Rainier in Washington state.
But the danger of recovering the bodies of the two guides and four climbers believed to have fallen 3,300 feet from their last known location is too great, park officials say.
"People are very understanding that we cannot risk another life at this point," Patti Wold, a Mount Rainier National Park spokeswoman, said Sunday.
The climbers were last heard from at 6 p.m. Wednesday when the guides checked in with their Seattle-based company, Alpine Ascents International, by satellite phone. The group failed to return Friday as planned.
FULL story at link.
Read more: http://apnews.excite.com/article/20140601/missing_rainier_climbers-68cfd6781c.html
Mount Rainier is seen from the road to Paradise Visitor Center at Mount Rainier National Park on Sunday, June 1, 2014. Six climbers are presumed dead after officials say they likely fell thousands of feet in the worst alpine accident on the mountain in decades. (AP Photo/Rachel La Corte)
Skittles
(153,261 posts)I hope they can understand
mzmolly
(51,016 posts)sad.
jimlup
(7,968 posts)Was the lead guide and the only name of the deceased that has been released.
He was our lead guide when I did a climb with Alpine Ascents up the Kautz Glacier route on Rainier back in '10.
RIP Matt
http://www.alpineascents.com/hegeman.asp
Stargazer09
(2,132 posts)Rainier is a beautiful mountain, but it's also dangerously unstable.
sakabatou
(42,198 posts)AtheistCrusader
(33,982 posts)3,300 feet. Wow.
mahatmakanejeeves
(57,720 posts)From 2012:
Ranger killed during rescue of climbers on Mount Rainier
Originally published Thursday, June 21, 2012 at 10:57 PM
A ranger with Mount Rainier National Park died Thursday afternoon while rescuing climbers, two of whom had fallen into a crevasse.
Nick Hall, a climbing ranger at Mount Rainier National Park, fell 3,700 feet to his death Thursday afternoon, after helping rescue two climbers who had fallen into a crevasse, according to a park news release. The two women who fell into the crevasse were part of a party of four, two women and two men, from Waco, Texas.
As Hall, 34, was preparing some of the climbers for helicopter evacuation at 4:59 p.m., he fell down the mountain's northeast side from the 13,700-foot level. He was not moving after his fall, and attempts to contact him were unsuccessful, the release said.
Climbers reached him hours later and confirmed he had died.
....
Material from The Associated Press was used in this report.
Alexa Vaughn: 206-464-2515 or avaughn@seattletimes.com