A tragic accident in Washington left three climbers dead over the weekend. One climber survived the ordeal and was able to get to safety and call for help. The Okanogan County Sheriff’s Office says that an anchor failure likely caused the four climbers to fall.
The Okanogan County Sheriff’s Office further reports that it responded to a climbing accident on May 11, Mother’s Day, in the northern Early Winters Spire area of Washington’s North Cascade mountain range. Four climbers from Renton, Washington fell while descending a steep gully.
“Three individuals were confirmed deceased at the accident site,” the Sheriff’s Office wrote in a Facebook post sharing the sad news. “The fourth member of the party self-extricated and contacted law enforcement.”
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The three deceased climbers were ages 36, 47, and 63. The Sheriff’s Office says a Snohomish County Helicopter Rescue Team extricated the deceased climbers from the “technical, mountainous terrain.” Officials believe an anchor failure caused the accident, but there is an ongoing investigation.
Read The Okanogan County Sheriff’s Office’s entire post about the anchor-failure incident that took three climbers’ lives here:
Header image by Ron Clausen/CC BY-SA 4.0