Relatives reported that they were due to return home on Friday.
The bodies of two hikers who died in an apparent 30-meter fall from an ice mountain cliff in Maine’s Acadia National Park, were located and recovered after an aerial and land search was initiated when they were reported missing by relatives.
The bodies were discovered on Saturday morning at Dorr Mountain in Acadia National Park, near Bar Harbor, by a voluntary search group, according to a statement from the National Park Service.
The walkers were described as a 28-year-old man and a 30-year-old woman, both from Rutland, Massachusetts. Their names were not immediately released.
The pair arrived in Bar Harbor on Tuesday and were last heard around noon on Thursday, when the climber called family members on their cell phone and said they were interested in taking a hike on the Cadillac Mountain, which is close to Dorr Mountain, according to Jay Elhard, a spokesman for the National Park Service.
“The two hikers appear to have fallen about 30 meters along the ice-covered cliffs on Dorr Mountain,” Elhard said in a statement.
He said family members contacted National Park Service guards on Friday afternoon to report that the pair had not checked out of the hotel as scheduled or returned to the vehicle.
A US Coast Guard helicopter rescue team from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, was sent to the park and scanned the area on the north and east sides of the Dorr and Cadillac Mountains on Friday night and Saturday using thermal imaging technology, but not was successful.
A team of volunteers from 15 members of Mount Desert Island Search and Rescue began a land search on Saturday morning and located the bodies.
The incident came just days after a 26-year-old hiker had to be rescued after slipping and falling off a steep, icy section of the park’s precipice trail. The climber, who was visiting Acadia for the first time, was rescued on March 3 by an Army National Guard helicopter team after his fall left him with minor injuries and clung to a tree to avoid sliding down the face of a cliff. , park officials said. .
“All trails in Acádia are incredibly freezing at the moment due to recent rains followed by days of cold weather,” said Elhard. “Hikers must be prepared for cold and icy conditions with extra layers of clothing and traction control devices.”