NBC News calls it "spectacular" and "little-visited," but another descriptor for North Cascades National Park is "often fatal." Nestled in Washington's Cascade Mountains north of Seattle, the park saw 14 deaths in the 15 years between 2007 and 2021, which might not seem that steep, until one factors in an average annual visitor rate of 25,000—giving it 3.7 deaths for every 100,000 visitors. For context, that's more than three times the next deadliest park, Alaska's Wrangell-St. Elias National Park Reserve, and many larger parks manage millions of visitors a year with a much lower fatality rate. NBC notes that if Alaska's Denali National Park clocked the same death rate with its average half-million visitors, it would register 16 deaths per year. Indeed, Thrillist ranks North Cascades as the 58th most-visited national park out of 63.
Wherein lies the danger? The park's rugged, untamed beauty is both its allure and its risk. A former North Cascades ranger with three decades under her belt says the mountains often prove deadly to very experienced hikers and climbers, who either plunge to their deaths or are hit by avalanches or falling rock and ice. "It's a very hazardous park," she says. "It would be easy to die in that park." The park has a ban on bolted anchors for climbers, which wades into a debate over safety vs. intrusion into nature. Says a national park service spokeswoman: "Each park has inherent and unique risks, and while some park activities are riskier than others, it does not necessarily make the park more 'dangerous.'" Click for much more. (More national parks stories.)
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