Hiker in NH Dies in 100mph Winds, Subzero Temps

NYC's Kate Matrosova found dead of exposure
By Jenn Gidman,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 17, 2015 8:51 AM CST
Hiker in NH Dies in 100mph Winds, Subzero Temps
Rescuers on Monday found the body of Kate Matrosova, a 32-year-old female hiker on Mount Adams, Washington, after battling extreme weather for hours.   (TomoUSA)

When Kate Matrosova's husband dropped her off at the base of New Hampshire's Mount Adams before dawn Sunday, he arranged to pick her up in a different part of the White Mountains, after she had traversed several summits, the New Hampshire Union Leader reports. But the 32-year-old credit trader—born in Siberia before coming to the US and settling down in NYC—never made it home, the New York Post reports. She set off her own emergency beacon Sunday afternoon, but rescuers were pushed back by subzero weather and 100mph winds. Her body was finally recovered between Mount Madison and Mount Adams yesterday morning by rescuers battling winds so strong that gusts were "actually blowing guys off their feet," NH Fish and Game Lt. Wayne Saunders tells the Union Leader. Matrosova reportedly died of exposure.

Matrosova was an avid outdoors enthusiast based on what appears to be her Facebook page, notes the New York Daily News, with postings related to paintball, whitewater rafting, and rock climbing. Besides the perilous weather, her personal locator beacon wasn't able to give an accurate location for her, WMUR notes. "Unfortunately, a lot of the coordinates that we received over the night [were] all over the place within a mile circumference," another NH Fish and Game rep tells WMUR. "If you are [going to] hike in this type of weather, you need to be in a more sheltered area, not up on an open exposed ridgeline. There's just no room for error in a place like that." Saunders tells the Union Leader, however, that Matrosova was dressed properly for her mountain trek and if it had been "a nice day she would have been fine." (More hiker death stories.)

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