Waterfall Canyon Hike

On January 20, I went with 2 men from my ward (Daniel and Hayden) and 2 of Daniel's friends on a hike to Waterfall Canyon. This was the first time I had done a hike in wintertime. It was beautiful but slick. Not too long after we started, a guy came running past us saying there had been a bad accident up at the waterfall. Some ice had fallen and had hit a woman in the head, and if we continued to go up, not get too close to the waterfall. 

We decided to continue onward. We started to hear a drone-like sound in the sky. We looked up and saw that Life Flight had been called. They circled for a long time looking for a place to land. Unfortunately, there wasn't one and the downdraft from it caused more ice to fall up at the waterfall (I was told later by 2 men I passed).

We kept going. At some point, we all got separated. I know I slowed down when I put on some spikes and then was just going at a slower pace. We had talked about not going all the way up. I kept expecting to run into the guys at any minute. At some point I passed 2 gentlemen and we talked for a minute about the accident and how crazy it was up at the waterfall. We heard a third set of ice fall. I guess that should have been my clue that I was close to the waterfall. I thought I was a ways off. I kept going on and the next time I looked up, I was at the waterfall. I took a few photos and realized that they were walking down the woman who had been hit in the head with the ice. I don't think search and rescue had gotten there yet, and With the ice being as unstable and falling, they decided it would be safer to move her. 

She walked past me. She had one guy leading her down (he was facing her going backward) and a girl holding her up from the back. She had one arm tucked into her coat (as if it was in a sling), and she had her head had the coat hood pulled up. I'm assuming she also had some other padding in that because her head was kind of cone-shaped. I suppose some of it could have been ice stuck in her head. I just kept thinking to myself, "What a tough lady." 

I finally caught up with the guys and we took a few pictures (I don't have any of the group photos) and started our way back down. It was even slicker going down. There were a few times I looked at how steep it was to go down and decided it would be better to slide on my butt purposefully instead of falling and sliding. It wasn't long before we caught up to everyone walking down, including the gal who had been hit in the head with the ice. We finally made it to a road and the girl was able to get into a search and rescue snow machine to then meet up with the ambulance to go to the hospital.  

What an eventful hike. I wouldn't mind doing a winter hike again, but I would be okay with a little less adventure.

For a news article and pictures visit https://www.fox13now.com/news/local-news/hiker-injured-by-falling-chunk-of-ice-on-ogden-trail.