Hiker found dead on trail in Grand Canyon, second such fatality in 2 months
CBSN
A hiker was found dead along a trail in the Grand Canyon last week, marking the second such fatality in two months at the national park. Officials have identified the hiker as James Handschy, a 65-year-old man from Oracle, Arizona, which is near Tucson.
Rescuers and Grand Canyon park rangers found Handschy unresponsive on THursday, after the park's regional communications center received an alert from a personal locator beacon — a device that hikers can use to transmit individual distress signals from remote areas — on Bright Angel Trail, the National Park Service said.
One of several backcountry trails in the Grand Canyon that have become popular routes for visitors, Bright Angel Trail takes hikers from a trailhead along the South Rim down to the Colorado River, which runs through the bottom of the canyon. The distance from the trailhead to the river is just shy of eight miles, with an elevation change of about 4,460 feet, according to the park service. It passes through Havasupai Gardens, a rest area less than five miles from the start of the trail.
