- Hiking couple Andrew Niziol and Patty Bolan were found dead Thursday.
- They were climbing Mount Whitney in California.
- The couple fell after becoming separated from their friend on a steep climb.
California authorities have recovered and identified the bodies of two hikers who disappeared while climbing the highest mountain in the contiguous United States.
Tulare County Sheriff’s Office officials told local media Thursday that the couple, identified as Andrew Niziol, 28, and Patty Bolan, 29, were found after search teams on foot and in helicopter will search the 14,500-foot-high Mount Whitney in central California on Thursday.
On Tuesday, Niziol, who was from South Lake Tahoe, and Bolan, who had just finished doctoral studies in physics at UC Davis, did not show up to their camp at Upper Boy Scout Lake, which is located east of the peak.
They told their campmates that they intended to hike up to Notch, a small flat spot on the mountain often used as a rest point, before skiing back.
Just one day before the pair, who were on a long hiking trip in California, were identified, a friend of theirs revealed that he had been climbing with them, but got separated on an extremely steep and icy part of the mountain.
Search teams on foot and by helicopter scoured 14,500-foot-high Mount Whitney in central California on Thursday to find the missing couple.
Ethan Michael Cannaert said he was looking forward to meeting the pair, who he said had “backcountry experience and had the right equipment to climb” the mountain, in Notch.
“I waited there for over an hour and was forced to go down the slide to escape the cold wind, but I never saw them,” Cannaert wrote in a Facebook post in a group dedicated to Mount Whitney.
The Notch is the last stop before a nearly vertical stretch of the mountain known as the ‘Final 400’.
Descending the Final 400 requires climbers to have specialized equipment, given the icy terrain, or face doom by falling potentially thousands of feet down the mountainside.
While details on where exactly they were found are scarce, local police revealed that they were found at an elevation of 13,200 feet on the north side of the mountain, while it is located almost a thousand feet below Notch.
The exact causes of their deaths are still unknown.
In one of his last social media posts, Andrew wrote on Facebook: “If I could go back in time and show my 12 year old what my life is like now, I would be so proud.”
‘This is the kind of life I have dreamed of for 15 years. I’ve finally surrounded myself with people to share these types of experiences with and I couldn’t be more grateful.’