Washington—Cascade Mts., Mt. St. Helens: On 7 September 1953, a Sunday School party was out on the Toutle glacier without mountaineering equipment or ropes. One of the boys started to slip into an open crevasse when the leader of the party, Dr. Raymond Roy, grabbed him. Just then another boy, Ted Sageser (16), slipped and plunged into a crevasse falling 30-40 ft. The weather was good and the accident occurred in the afternoon, but by the time a Longview Mountain Rescue Council party arrived at midnight, the boy was dead. According to reports the injured boy was alive up to a few minutes before the rescuers arrived.

Source: Ralph Johnson and Ome Daiber.

Analysis: An inexperienced party that did not recognize the hazards present on a glacier.