The Chaffee County Sheriff’s Office said this week that a rock anchoring a rappelling system likely gave way, causing the deaths of two Colorado Mountain College students on West Apostle Mountain, about 100 miles southeast of Aspen.
Kaden Matsuda, 19, of Ridgway, Colorado, and Jackson Donlon, 20, of Queensbury, New York, were found dead in a snow-filled basin after failing to return from a weekend climbing trip. Both were students at Colorado Mountain College’s Leadville campus.
According to the sheriff’s office, Donlon was beginning his descent from an anchor point that had been backed up with additional safety protections when the rock securing it likely failed. Matsuda was attached to the same anchor, and both men fell together. Investigators have not determined the exact distance of the fall.
The students had originally planned to climb nearby Ice Mountain before apparently deciding to attempt West Apostle Mountain instead, authorities said.
Autopsies found that both men died instantly from multiple blunt force injuries. Authorities said the severe snowstorm in the area at the time was not a direct factor in the deaths.
Investigators said they found no obvious errors in how the students had prepared for the climb.
“In most similar cases that have led to a devastating conclusion we find it easy to pick apart what was done wrong,” Chaffee County Sheriff Andy Rohrich said. “That was not the case with Kaden and Jackson.”
Rohrich also said there was some comfort in knowing the two did not suffer.
“While their lives were far too short, they spent their final moments together surrounded by the majestic beauty of Chaffee County’s high peaks that they loved,” he said. “There is also relief knowing neither of them suffered.”
Matsuda had been studying to become a wildland firefighter, and Donlon was studying outdoor recreation leadership. Both were described as sharing a deep passion for the outdoors.
The accident is among several fatal climbing incidents reported in recent months, including the death of elite rock climber Jake Whisenant, 30, at California’s Sequoia National Park this summer, and the deaths of three Latvian mountaineers near Denali Pass on Alaska’s Mount McKinley earlier this year.
