Last week, a tragedy occurred when yet another person fell to their demise at the Grand Canyon Skywalk attraction, the most hazardous National Park in the United States.
On June 5, a 33-year-old unidentified male plummeted down the 4,000-foot deep Colorado River. Upon receiving the report, rescue teams with rope specialists and helicopters reacted by 9:00 a.m. and discovered the man had already passed away.
His body was brought to the Hualapai Nation, the institution that manages the glass bridge which extends 70 feet over the rim of the canyon. It is uncertain at this time whether the man was on the bridge itself or the edge of the Skywalk when he fell.
In the wake of the incident, the Mojave County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue shared a phone number for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on their Facebook page and said that the investigation is ongoing. This could be due to the fact that all personal items such as cell phones and backpacks must be stored when entering the Skywalk, potentially making it difficult to immediately identify the man.
Based on a Freedom of Information Act request, The Post reported last week that the Grand Canyon is the most fatal National Park in the U.S., with 56 people being reported missing from 2018 to February and six people being found dead. Experts believe that the death toll at the vast park is probably higher than the number that is recorded.
Records indicate that over the last five years, 1,100 people have gone missing in the nation’s National Parks.