Hiker's body on Longs Peak identified
The hiker whose body was found Friday morning below the Keyhole Route on Longs Peak has been identified by the Boulder County Coroner's office as 18-year-old Nicholas L. Hellbusch of Lenexa, Kansas.
Park spokeswoman Kyle Patterson said the incident is still under investigation.
Hellbusch's body was spotted last Friday morning by hikers climbing the popular fourteener. His body was recovered below the Ledges section on the Keyhole Route and flown to the helipad at Upper Beaver Meadows in Rocky Mountain National Park. Hellbusch's body was then transferred to the Boulder County Coroner's office.
This is the second fatality of the year on 14,259-foot-tall Longs Peak. Matthew Burklow, 25, of Fort Collins died on the mountain June 9.
Since the national park opened in 1915, 60 people have died while climbing Longs Peak, one of Colorado's most popular peaks above 14,000 feet.
In a 2002 park study, officials found that about 10,000 people every year summit Longs Peak from among the 25,000 who hike the trail. The peak season for climbing Longs is mid-July through October, when the snow melts in the spring and before winter begins at high elevation.
The 7.5-mile Keyhole Route is the preferred way up the mountain, rated by 14ers.com as the 14th most-difficult fourteener among the 54 in Colorado.