Mount Hood climbing accidents are mountain climbing- or hiking-related incidents on Oregon's Mount Hood. As of 2007, about 10,000 people attempt to climb Mount Hood each year. As of May 2002, more than 130 people have died climbing Mount Hood since records have been kept. One of the worst climbing accidents occurred in 1986, when seven teenagers and two school teachers froze to death while attempting to retreat from a storm.
Despite a quadrupling of forest visitors since 1990, the number of people requiring rescue remains steady at around 25 to 50 per year, largely because of the increased use of cell phones and GPS devices. In 2006, 3.4 percent of search and rescue missions were for mountain climbers. In comparison, 20% were for vehicles (including ATVs and snowmobiles), 3% were for mushroom collectors, the remaining 73.6 percent were for skiers, boaters, and participants in other mountain activities.
Regardless of route, Mount Hood is a technical climb which requires ropes, crampons, and ice axes. Approximately 95% of Mount Hood's climbs occur April through July.
Read more about Mount Hood Climbing Accidents: Hazards
Famous quotes containing the words mount, hood, climbing and/or accidents:
“If you would feel the full force of a tempest, take up your residence on the top of Mount Washington, or at the Highland Light, in Truro.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“We thought her dying when she slept,
And sleeping when she died.”
—Thomas Hood (1799–1845)
“An old, mad man still climbing in his ghost,
My fathers’ ghost is climbing in the rain.”
—Dylan Thomas (1914–1953)
“The day-laborer is reckoned as standing at the foot of the social scale, yet he is saturated with the laws of the world. His measures are the hours; morning and night, solstice and equinox, geometry, astronomy, and all the lovely accidents of nature play through his mind.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)