OCR Text |
Show Women Meet Death On Mountain Peak Cold Mad! it Impossible for Them to Cling to Perch. SANTA FE, N. M. Deaths of two mountain climbers were ascribed to I biting cold which made it impossible impos-sible for them to cling to an Ice-glazed Ice-glazed perch long enough for their , guide to summon help. Bodies of the pair Miss Mildred Hartig, 29, of Evansville, Ind., and Miss Frances B. Krauss, 34, of Baltimore Bal-timore were recovered on precipitous precipi-tous North Truchas peak, in the Sangre da Crlsto range north of here. The guide, Sam Martin of Truchas village, said attempts to rescue Miss Krauss, .who slipped In de scending the 13.275-foot mountain, led to the double tragedy. The accident happened as the women turned homeward on a weekend week-end outing from the Los Alamos atomic project Both worked there as Atomic Energy commission secretaries. sec-retaries. Martin said Miss Krauss lost her footing and injured her head and leg in a 250-foot tumble. As the guide and Miss Hartig sought means to get her back on safe ground, she slid farther down the snow-covered slope. Both women were unable to climb back to safety, Martin related, and clutched a small rock above a ravine ra-vine as he clambered up and around the peak, and descended to their horses for a rope. Thereafter, Martin said, while he tried vainly to reach them from above and below, the women wept and begged piteously for him to "please do something, we're freezing freez-ing to death." Meanwhile, darkness and dropping drop-ping temperature froze the mountainside moun-tainside glassy slick, and Martin was unable' to reach them. Near midnight, Martin went for help. State police, answering his summons, helped Martin find the broken bodies. |