Hiker's body recovered from Mount Wilson
From staff reports
Article Launched: 02/04/2008 11:02:07 PM PST
MOUNT WILSON - After being hampered by bad weather and a weekend rock slide that blocked Mount Wilson Road, authorities Monday used a helicopter to recover the body of a 32-year-old hiker who slipped and fell about 1,000 feet down a mountainside Saturday.
Nicole Flaten of Los Angeles was with members of her hiking club near Chantry Flat on Saturday when she apparently lost her footing. She fell into an ice chute at about 11:45 a.m., according to a statement from the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, which investigated her death.
"Because she was in an ice chute, there was no way for her to stop the fall," said sheriff's Sgt. Bill Marsh.
Flaten fell about 1,000 feet from where her group had been hiking, "hitting trees and rocks" as she fell, Marsh said.
A member of her hiking club, risking great personal injury to himself, hiked down to Flaten to check on her condition, he said.
"He came back up and reported that she appeared to be dead," Marsh said.
Members of the Sierra Madre Search and Rescue Team arrived on scene at about 2 p.m., but because of poor weather conditions Saturday, team members finally were able to reach the spot at about 5:30 p.m.
By then, freezing temperatures, poor visibility and the rough terrain made recovering the body extremely difficult.
Complicating the recovery, a rock slide Saturday sent massive boulders onto Mount Wilson Road, blocking the passage. Some members of the
Monrovia Search and Rescue Team, which also went to the scene, were temporarily trapped behind the slide, but later were able to leave the area, sheriff's officials said.
Rescuers managed to bring the body up to about 200 feet from the road, Marsh said, before having to call off the operation at about 7:30 p.m. Saturday.
Bad weather on Sunday and the rock slide prevented authorities from reaching the spot.
Rescuers returned Monday morning, found the victim, and a helicopter from the sheriff's Emergency Operations Services airlifted the body off the mountain at about 11:30 a.m., Marsh said.
Work crews from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Works, meanwhile, were able to clear at least one lane of two-lane Mount Wilson Road and planned to return today to clear debris from the other lane, said public works spokesman Gary Boze.
"The road is very narrow at that spot. In fact, just to turn around, you have to drive back for several miles to find a spot wide enough to turn vehicles around," he said.
Because of poor weather and icy conditions, crews removing the slide are able to work only from about noon to about 5 p.m., Boze added.
Even after the rocks are cleared, Mount Wilson Road will remain closed to the general public because of the icy conditions, he said.
Only the few residents who live farther up the road, employees at the observatory and utility workers installing new transmission lines atop Mount Wilson, about 5,700 feet above the San Gabriel Valley, will be allowed access into the area, Boze said.
Flaten became the fourth person to die in the San Gabriel Mountains so far this year. In January, avalanches took the lives of three people near ski resorts in the mountains near Wrightwood.
U.S. Forest Service officials warned residents that winter conditions in the local mountains can quickly become extremely dangerous and warned that cell phone coverage in the San Gabriel Mountains is very limited.
