FALL ON ROCK, INADEQUATE PROTECTION

Colorado, Eldorado Canyon State Park

In mid May, Jerome Stiller (50), a part-time instructor in Regis University’s teacher training program, was supposed to play the “victim” in a mountain rescue exercise Saturday. Instead, he ended up dangling unconscious for real at the end of a climbing rope. He fell about 100 feet, slamming repeatedly into the face of a mountain before his fall was broken by [protection] that held his rope, although his first piece of protection pulled out.

“I hit a lot of things,” Stiller said Monday at St. Anthony Central Hospital, where he was taken by Flight for Life. “I must have bounced off a lot of stuff on the way down. I thank God I was wearing my helmet,” Stiller said, holding up a dented bloody helmet.

He had broken a shoulder blade, the bone above his left eye, and a small bone in his back and a leg, in addition to multiple scrape wounds. (Source: From an article by Benny Morson, The Rocky Mountain News, posted on line)