Two climbers found themselves trapped hundreds of feet up Whiteside Mountain after sunset Friday, dangling on a nearly vertical rock face as night fell and temperatures dropped into the mid-30s. It took 19 volunteers and roughly four and a half hours to get them down safely.
The Glenville-Cashiers Rescue Squad received the climbers’ call for help around 7:25 p.m. Friday, according to The Charlotte Observer. Rescuers located the pair about 600 feet above the base of the mountain’s nearly vertical 1,000-foot rock face, the outlet reported. In a Facebook post cited by the same report, the rescue squad said the climbers had reported being stranded on the sheer rock face of Whiteside Mountain.
Whiteside Mountain is a landmark along the Eastern Continental Divide, rising 4,930 feet above the Nantahala National Forest. It sits south of U.S. 64 between Highlands and Cashiers, roughly 160 miles west of uptown Charlotte by car.
What Went Wrong on the Rock Face
Rescuers said the climbers had used unconventional climbing techniques and encountered significant technical failures involving their limited gear, the Observer’s report notes. Hazardous conditions, worsened by recent heavy rainfall, compounded the difficulties, according to the same account…