A group of 10 special forces soldiers were helicoptered off Longs Peak in Rocky Mountain National Park on Friday after two of them fell ill with altitude sickness, according to Army officials.
Lt. Col. Sean Ryan, an Army spokesman, said the soldiers were on a routine training mission Thursday when the two soldiers became sick while climbing the 14,249-foot peak. No one was injured.
The soldiers, members of the 10th Special Forces Group that is stationed at Fort Carson in Colorado Springs, summited Longs Peak after two members of their group fell ill. Ryan said the group had to reach the summit in order to be flown off the mountain.
“It’s normal procedure for us,” Ryan said of high-altitude mountain climbing training.
The national park says rangers were summoned to help the soldiers late Thursday night. The soldiers were not planning to spend the night on the mountain, which is still under winter conditions.
The park service said one of the soldiers is a medic, who tended to his ill comrades.
“It’s important to recognize they were able to finish the climb this morning without assistance,” Mark Pita, the park’s chief ranger, told reporters at a news conference.
Pita said the soldiers were climbing a difficult section of Long Peak, known as Kiener’s Route, when they encountered problems.
Kyle Patterson, a spokeswoman for the national park, said none of the military personnel were ever missing or ever overdue, as initially reported. A television helicopter image of the soldiers showed them gathered on the Longs Peak’s summit.
Longs Peak can be a treacherous climb and the mountain has claimed some 60 lives since it became part of Rocky Mountain National Park in 1915, Patterson said.
