Two climbers found themselves trapped hundreds of feet up Whiteside Mountain after sunset Friday, dangling on a nearly vertical rock face as night fell and temperatures dropped into the mid-30s. It took 19 volunteers and roughly four and a half hours to get them down safely.
The Glenville-Cashiers Rescue Squad received the climbers' call for help around 7:25 p.m. Friday, according to The Charlotte Observer. Rescuers located the pair about 600 feet above the base of the mountain's nearly vertical 1,000-foot rock face, the outlet reported. In a Facebook post cited by the same report, the rescue squad said the climbers had reported being stranded on the sheer rock face of Whiteside Mountain.
Whiteside Mountain is a landmark along the Eastern Continental Divide, rising 4,930 feet above the Nantahala National Forest. It sits south of U.S. 64 between Highlands and Cashiers, roughly 160 miles west of uptown Charlotte by car.
What Went Wrong on the Rock Face
Rescuers said the climbers had used unconventional climbing techniques and encountered significant technical failures involving their limited gear, the Observer's report notes. Hazardous conditions, worsened by recent heavy rainfall, compounded the difficulties, according to the same account.
A High Angle Rescue Team climbed down the mountain to reach the stranded pair, then secured them with a technical rope rescue system before pulling them to the summit, the rescue squad said. One climber had to be pulled 230 feet up, while the other was pulled 350 feet, per the same account. The work unfolded at night, with temperatures falling into the mid-30s and wind gusts reaching 40 mph.
A Four-and-a-Half-Hour Operation
Both climbers were brought to safety and transported to rescue vehicles by 11:55 p.m., about four and a half hours after the initial emergency call, the rescue squad reported. Nineteen volunteers took part in the operation, including members of Jackson County Emergency Management, while Highlands Fire and Rescue also assisted. The identities of the climbers and details of their condition were not released.
Earlier Welfare Check on Whiteside
Whiteside Mountain has drawn rescue crews before. In October 2020, Plateau Daily News reported that crews responded to a welfare check after Highlands Fire & Rescue received a call about two climbers possibly trapped on a rope; crews used a drone to make visual contact and located the climbers on the sheer 800-foot cliff face, confirming they were not in danger and that no one was hurt.
Similar high-angle rescues have played out elsewhere in the Southeast and beyond. CBS News Atlanta reported that White County Emergency Management used a drone to locate a climber about 260 feet up Mount Yonah in North Georgia, with a firefighter rappelling down to help the climber off a narrow ledge in a rescue officials said took about 42 minutes. In New Hampshire, Outside reported that nine volunteer climbers helped free a climber stuck nearly 500 feet up Whitehorse Ledge while free soloing without a rope, fixing ropes back to the cliff's base to bring him down.
