Nine climbers fell into a crevasse on Thursday near the summit of 3 372 metre Mount Hood in Oregon and three died. A helicopter attempting to rescue the survivors crashed on the mountainside.
One person on the Blackhawk helicopter was critically injured, and ”we’re trying to assess the rest,” said Angela Blanchard, representative for the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Department.
Four people, including the pilot and co-pilot, were on board, she said. Three of the climbers were critically injured, and a helicopter had taken one of them off the mountain before the crash.
At least one other injured climber was being transported to a hospital early afternoon. Blanchard said she didn’t know what caused the chopper to crash.
Television news helicopters showed the Oregon Air National Guard helicopter hovering and then smashing into the mountain not far from the crevasse into which the climbers had fallen. The Blackhawk’s nose hit the snow, and the aircraft then rolled down a slope.
Sgt. Alan Alderman of the Clark County Sheriff’s Department was monitoring radio traffic and said he heard the transmission, ”Chopper’s going down, chopper’s going down.”
Two groups of climbers were about 240 metres from the summit of Oregon’s highest mountain when they fell into the crevasse about 9 am (1400 GMT). A paramedic with the group used his cellphone to call for help.
Rescuers had set out on foot, in helicopters and in snow vehicles in an attempt to reach the victims. Three of the climbers died when they fell, and three others were reported critically injured, Blanchard said.
The weather was sunny and winds were calm, easing the task of helicopter crews, but officials said any high-altitude operation is risky.
It was not immediately known whether the climbers were ascending the peak or coming down when the accident happened. Keith Mischke, executive director of a climbing club, said the crevasse into which the climbers fell is about eight to nine metres deep. Climbers normally go around it or cross it on one of the snow bridges that naturally form across the gap, he said.
”They go across the bridges one at a time usually – a snow bridge can be between half a metre or five metres wide,” he said. But he added: ”If somebody falls they could pull the others in.”
The accident came a day after a man and a woman died on Mount Rainier, about 60 kilometres to the north of Mount Hood in Washington state. Rescuers believe they also spotted the body of a second woman. The climbers, two from Germany and the third from Lebanon, Oregon, were trapped during a storm.
Mount Hood is the site of one of the worst climbing disasters in the United States. In May 1986, nine teenagers and two teachers from the Oregon Episcopal School in Portland froze to death while retreating from a storm during an annual climb by students and staff.
Eleven people died on Mount Rainier in 1981 when they were caught in a massive icefall.
In the past 100 years, experts say there have been 130 deaths on Mount Hood. In the last 10 years in the United States, there have been an average of 30 climbing fatalities per year, said Jed Williamson, who edits the Accidents in North American Mountaineering publication for the American Alpine Club. – Sapa-AP