ElCap Reports

ElCap Report 5/17/15

By Tom Evans

Yo.. I sit at my table, in the Café, as the rain pours down just outside the window.  It started a bit after noon and continues unabated.  The gloom of the day is heightened by the death, last evening, of two of our community’s best people.  Dean Potter, and Graham Hunt, perished late in the evening when a BASE jump from Taft Point went terribly wrong.  Yosemite Search and Rescue received word last night that the men were overdue and immediately sent out ground parties, to search for them.  I awoke, just after dawn, when a helicopter flew low over the house I was staying in, while searching for the men.  I heard that they were over due and was at the EC Meadow, doing my daily shooting, when friends came by and confirmed the tragedy.  The men’s bodies were recovered by noon and many friends gathered throughout the morning and afternoon to seek comfort and share their grief. 

By now word of the accident has spread far and wide.  We await the official word from the Park Service investigation as to the details of the accident.  I will post more information as it becomes available.  Our deepest sympathies go out to family and friends of these two exceptional men.  They will live on, as we remember them in our thoughts and through the stories about them, we will pass on to others.

There was scant activity on ElCap today as the weather forecast kept parties close to the ground.  There was a Dolt run early in the day and the PO party thought better of the weather situation and wisely bailed from the top of the third pitch, this morning. 

So, sadly, that’s the way it is, on this Sunday, the 17^th day of May, 2015.

Capt. Tom….