Victim to the biggest collapse in Yosemite turned out to be a Brit
The administration of Yosemite national Park called the name of the man killed in the collapse of a granite cliff El Capitan. The dead were 32-year-old Welshman Andrew foster.
According to eyewitnesses, from the cliff broke off a piece “the size of a multi-storey building”. The climbers were “in the wrong place at the wrong time”, — commented the accident the representative of the Park.
The woman, ascending the rock with foster, probably his wife was hospitalized in critical condition.
The reason for its massive sell-off that occurred on Wednesday, still not installed. Mountain El Capitan is made of granite and so strong collapses on it are rare.
“I saw a piece of stone the size of a multi — storey building- not less than 30 by 30 meters. He suddenly separated from the wall, there were no signs”, — described the collapse of a climber Peter Sabrok in an interview with the associated press.
At the time of the crash, which occurred near a popular climbing route in Krugersdorp-Raut, rock climbed about 30 people, a video filmed and photographed. Most of them were above the collapse when it occurred.
Moment of deadly rock slide on Yosemite’s El Capitan: https://t.co/MZv76tWOhL via @YouTube
— Shannon C. Gordon (@ShannonCGord1) 28 Sep 2017
After the first collapse was followed by several more. In four hours, according to Park, they had been seven.
Deadly incidents on the cliffs of Yosemite are rare.
According to official data from the office for parks and reserves of the United States, in the Park there are about a hundred accidents a year, but they rarely results in death.
In the period from 1970 to 1990 deaths was only 50.
The last fatality at the El Capitan occurred in 2013 and before that in 1999.
On El Capitan large landslides occur relatively infrequently. In 2013, the geologists explored the El Capitan in an attempt to explain this phenomenon. They found that the surface of the granite rocks at some points weaker than in other places.