Yosemite rock fall tragedy: Shropshire woman injured and husband killed in cliff face collapse
A climber from Shropshire was left trapped under 1,000 tonnes of rock and her husband tragically killed at the Yosemite National Park in the US.
Lucy Foster, 28, originally from Market Drayton, and her husband Andrew Foster, 32, had been preparing to climb the El Capitan monolith on Wednesday when tragedy struck.
The pair, who lived together in Cardiff, were found with climbing equipment, and are believed to have been scouting out the ascent from a trail when a “sheet” of granite around 40 metres by 20 metres plummeted from a height of 200 metres.
It was this morning confirmed that Andrew had died and that Lucy had been taken to hospital with her injuries.
On September 2, Lucy posted a picture of Andrew in front of a van on Facebook saying "the adventure begins!".
They had recently just celebrated their first wedding anniversary.
Andrew was a manager with outdoors equipment and clothing company Patagonia, who confirmed their employee was killed in the accident.
Lucy works in the same industry, and the couple had practiced for their trip by climbing cliffs in Cornwall and Pembrokeshire.
Scott Gediman, from the Yosemite National Park, said: “With all the craziness I don’t exactly know where they were going but chances are they were going up.
“From what I understand they were buried under rock… They were crushed by falling rocks.”
He could not be specific about their injuries but said they were “consistent with tonnes of granite falling on you”.
They are the only known casualties despite being with a group of other climbers when the series of collapses struck, but a search is ongoing.
Mr Foster’s death is the first fatality from a rock fall in the park in 18 years when another climber was killed, according to the parks service.
Foreign Office spokesman said: “We are in contact with the local authorities and providing assistance to both families at this very difficult time.”
Rocks at the world-renowned park's climbing routes break loose and crash down about 80 times a year.
"It's a lot like a lightning strike," said Alex Honnold, who made history June 3 for being the first to climb El Capitan alone and without ropes. "Sometimes geology just happens."
The last time a climber was killed by a rock falling at Yosemite was in 2013, when a Montana climber fell after a rock dislodged and sliced his climbing rope.
It was preceded by a 1999 rock fall that crushed a climber from Colorado. Park officials say rock falls overall have killed 16 people since 1857 and injured more than 100.
The rock falls came during the peak of the climbing season for El Capitan, with climbers from around the world trying their skill against the sheer cliff faces.
