Argentine hiker plummets 2,000 feet to death off mountain in California

(KTLA) — A 45-year-old man from Argentina plummeted some 2,000 feet to his death on Mt. Shasta earlier this month, officials have announced.  

Matias Augusto Travizano reached the summit on the morning of Sept. 12 after taking the Clear Creek Route, considered one of the mountain’s safer trails, the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office said late last week. 

It was on his descent that he and another climber, who had summited at around the same time as the 45-year-old, both lost their bearings, wandered off trail and found themselves stranded on an ice sheet at the northern tip of Wintun Glacier at an elevation of about 13,500 feet.  

“Realizing that they were on the wrong route, the men attempted to glissade down to a lower section of the mountain and reenter the trail,” sheriff’s officials said. 

During the attempted controlled slide, Travizano lost control, careened down the ice sheet and collided with a boulder 300 feet below. The force of the impact knocked the 45-year-old unconscious.  

The other hiker, who struggled for five to 10 minutes to reach Travizano and render aid, was within 80 feet of the Argentine when he regained consciousness and started moving around.  

“Tragically, this movement dislodged him from the rock and he slid down the remainder of the glacier and out of sight,” authorities detailed.  

From a different and more secure perch, a third hiker who’d been on the mountain that morning called 911, prompting a response from a SCSO Search and Rescue and climbing rangers with the U.S. Forest Service at the Clear Creek Trailhead just before 2:30 p.m. 

Search and rescue crews requested air support from the California Highway Patrol’s Northern Air Operations, who after hours of searching for Travizano, found him dead at an elevation of 10,200 feet, near the base of Wintun Glacier.  

“It’s hard to regain the trail coming back down and a lot of people wander off into more dangerous drainages,” sheriff’s spokesperson Sage Milestone told the Los Angeles Times. “If you are not familiar with the terrain, and if you have poor visibility, it’s easy to get lost.” 

During a summer snowstorm on Aug. 16, a 50-year-old man fell to his death after losing his bearings on Clear Creek Trail.  

Mt. Shasta, a 14,179-foot stratovolcano, is in Northern California’s Cascade Mountain Range and, according to the U.S. Forest Service, draws more than 5,000 summit attempts each year. Famous for its accessibility, challenging terrain and breathtaking views of the forest and snowcapped mountaintops, the Cascade Range sees about one death per year on average.  

“Do not take for granted that it’s kind of a beginner mountain climber’s mountain, because there are a lot of hazards up there and especially with weather,” Milestone told The Times. “The summit conditions can change really dramatically, even if it seems like a mild day down on the ground.” 

So far this year, the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office has worked on 15 rescue missions on Mt. Shasta, nine of which CHP Northern Air Operations assisted in and another six that required search and rescue teams on the ground.  

“While the Clear Creek Route is considered one of the mountain’s ‘safer’ trails to the summit, climbers can become disoriented in low-visibility conditions, particularly when descending from the summit plateau,” sheriff’s officials said. “Once off trail, these climbers wander into more hazardous areas in the Ash Creek or Mud Creek drainages, where accidents are more likely to occur.”