The two young men who set off into Colorado’s Sawatch Mountains this month were both passionate about taking the outdoors seriously. One was studying to be a wildland firefighter, while the other hoped to become a mountain guide.
But both of them were found dead Wednesday, under circumstances that remain unclear. Local authorities spent days looking for missing hikers Kaden Matsuda, 19, and Jackson Donlon, 20.
The bodies were finally discovered near West Apostle Mountain on October 28, just outside of Gunnison, Colorado.
What happened?
Matsuda and Donlon, students at Colorado Mountain College in Leadville, had planned on hiking and camping near Ice Mountain, a 13,960-foot peak located about 50 miles from Gunnison.
They left for their trip on Oct. 23. College staff notified local authorities they were missing on Oct. 26, according to the Chaffee County Sheriff’s Office. The men’s families said they were both experienced hikers.
Matsuda was studying to be a wildland firefighter, and Donlon was training to become a mountain guide.
Kaden Matsuda, left, and Jackson Donlon. Supplied: Chaffee County Sheriff’s Office
Search-and-rescue teams were deployed and found their vehicle at the trailhead. Weather conditions looked risky, with heavy snow falling in Chaffee County.
“Ice Mountain is a very technical climb, and it is recommended that hikers be very experienced when trying to tackle it. That is when it is dry. Although there was only about eight inches of snow around Kaden’s vehicle and in the lower basin, Ice Mountain received one to two feet of snow,” the sheriff’s office said in a Facebook post.
Multiple local SAR teams worked on the case. Photo: Chaffee County Sheriff’s Office
Rescue teams used drones, helicopters, and dogs to search for the two hikers. On October 27, they located their tent, which had collapsed under the weight of the snow, near West Apostle Mountain (13,597 feet). Inside were sleeping bags, stoves, and other equipment, but the two men were nowhere to be found.
The next day, authorities announced they had found their bodies in the mountain’s basin. Officials declined to share potential causes of death, beyond stating that they did not suspect foul play.
The context
The Sawatch Range of the Rocky Mountains is home to many 13,000- and 14,000-foot peaks. Some of them, like West Apostle Mountain, require technical climbing ability and become substantially more difficult and dangerous during wet weather. The route up the mountain requires traversing fields of loose boulder scree and talus that can be hazardous after snow.
From 2010 to 2017, eight people have died in the Sawatch Mountains. Falls are the most common cause of fatalities for those tackling Colorado’s 13ers and 14ers, as the state’s highest mountains are known to locals.
This article first appeared on GearJunkie.
