by D.J. DeJong
Mountain Mail December 4, 2019
Two hikers and a dog were rescued from Mount Belford early Monday morning.
Chaffee County Search and Rescue North received a call reporting an overdue hiker on Mount Belford at about 3:45 a.m. Monday.
One of the hikers, Alec Landingham, 24, of the Denver area was using a GPS app, AllTrails location tracking.
Rebecca Hinds of Chaffee County Search and Rescue North said they did not have the name of the second hiker.
A family member was monitoring Landingham’s progress remotely and alerted the county communications center after becoming worried when his location was static for several hours.
A Search and Rescue ground team hiked up to Landingham’s last known coordinates, while Flight for Life Colorado assisted with a flyover and insertion of a second team above the hikers’ position.
A third team assisted with a drone search.
Search and Rescue teams were able to rappel down to the two hikers and their dog, who had been stranded on a cliff at an elevation of about 12,200 feet after getting off the trail in the dark.
Teams were then able to hike them out safely by about 10:15 a.m., a Search and Rescue press release stated.
