SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — Three hikers died over the weekend in suspected heat-related cases at state and national parks in Utah, including a father and daughter who got lost on a strenuous hike in Canyonlands National Park in triple-digit temperatures and another in Snow Canyon State Park.
A sign guides hikers along the Gila trail above Snow Canyon State Park, Utah, Jan. 23, 2024 | Photo by Alysha Lundgren, St. George News
At approximately 3:30 p.m., responding units from Washington County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue, Santa Clara – Ivins Police Department, a search team and park rangers found two hikers suffering from heat exhaustion in Snow Canyon State Park.
A multi-agency search team found and treated two hikers who were suffering from heat exhaustion. While they were treating those individuals, a passing hiker informed them of an unconscious person nearby. First responders found the 30-year-old woman dead, public safety officials said.
Her death is being investigated by the Santa Clara-Ivins Public Safety Department. She has not been identified publicly.
In Canyonlands, the daughter, 23, and her father, 52, sent a 911 text alerting dispatchers that they were lost and had run out of water while hiking the 8.1-mile Syncline Loop, described by the National Park Service as the most challenging trail in the Island in the Sky district of the southeast Utah park. The pair set out Friday to navigate steep switchbacks and scramble through boulder fields with limited trail markers as the air temperature surpassed 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
Park rangers and a helicopter crew with the Bureau of Land Management began their search for the lost hikers in the early evening Friday, but found them already dead. The San Juan County Sheriff’s Office identified them on Monday as Albino Herrera Espinoza and his daughter, Beatriz Herrera, of Green Bay, Wisconsin.
Due to the jagged terrain, safety officials used a helicopter to airlift the bodies out of the park and to the state medical examiner on Saturday morning, according to the sheriff’s office. Their deaths are being investigated as heat-related by the local sheriff and the National Park Service.
Tourists continue to flock to parks in Utah and other southwestern states during the hottest months of the year, even as officials caution that hiking in extreme heat poses serious health risks. Earlier this month, a Texas man died while hiking at Grand Canyon National Park, where summer temperatures on exposed parts of the trail can reach over 120 degrees.
Written by HANNAH SCHOENBAUM, The Associated Press
Copyright 2022 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.