Florida man dies in fall on steep slope in Montana’s Glacier National Park

A 79-year-old Florida man has died in a fall in Glacier National Park while he was trying to scramble up an off-trail slope with a group of friends, park officials said Tuesday.

The incident happened Monday morning on Rising Wolf Mountain, several hundred feet above the Two Medicine Campground in the southeastern part of the park, spokesperson Gina Kerzman said.

The friends descended to the victim’s location, yelled down to the campground for help and called 911. National Park Service staff responded.

A search helicopter operated by Two Bear Air, which had been working to recover the bodies of two men who had died in a climbing accident several days earlier, was temporarily diverted to help with the rescue.

The helicopter transported the unconscious man to the Two Medicine Ranger Station where an air ambulance was waiting. The air ambulance crew declared the man dead, authorities said.

The man’s name and hometown were being withheld until family members could be notified.

The bodies of the two 67-year-old Montana men who died in a fall on Dusty Star Mountain in the park’s interior were also recovered Monday, Kerzman said.

Brian McKenzie Kennedy of Columbia Falls and Jack Dewayne Beard of Kalispell were expert climbers who had been summitting mountain peaks in Glacier park for decades, park officials said in releasing their names Tuesday. Both were members of the Glacier Mountaineering Society, the park said in a statement.

The men had set out for a climb in Glacier National Park on July 22 and were to return the next day. They were reported missing on July 24 and their bodies were spotted by a search helicopter Monday morning.