Nick Hall Loses Life on Mount Rainier

Thirty-three year-old Nick Hall slid more than 3,000 feet to his death as he was helping to evacuate four climbers on Mount Rainier.

The last climber to be rescued, Stacy Wren, descended with Rainier National Park rangers on Friday during blizzard conditions and was whisked away by car that evening. Three other climbers were plucked off by a Chinook helicopter from Joint Base Lewis-McChord Thursday after the group fell and two of them ended up in a crevasse.

Eight other climbers who were trying to retrieve Hall’s body from the 10,000-foot level of the mountain were pinned down in a ground blizzard. They planned to spend the night at Camp Schurman at the 9,500-foot level and hoping for a weather window on Saturday, park spokeswoman Fawn Bauer said.

Hall, a four-year veteran of the park’s climbing program, came from a family of EMTs who’ve aided soldiers in Iraq and car crash victims in his small hometown of Patten, Maine. He was not married and had no children.

His father, Carter Hall, recalled his son was a loner as a child, but flourished in high school through a shared love of the wilderness. “For good and bad, it was my influence of the outdoors,” Hall told The Associated Press in a call from his Maine home, his voice breaking. His family both grieved and celebrated his life Friday.

Original story: http://www.newsoxy.com/world/ranger-mount-rainier-78485.html