A 19-year-old man survived a fall into a 400-foot ravine beneath a popular bridge in Washington state over Memorial Day weekend, authorities said.
The Mascon County Sheriff’s Office said the man fell Saturday while attempting to walk under the High Steel Bridge, one of the highest railroad bridges in the United States.
According to the Washington Trails Association (WTA), the trail was built by the Simpson Logging Company in 1929 and converted into a road in the 1950s or 1960s.
“He was walking on a washout that a lot of people use and it’s kind of a trail. It’s not a trail,” West Mason Fire Chief Matthew Welander told KING 5.
“It was a landslide, it was just too steep, and he went all the way down to the river and slipped.”
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The boy, whose identity has not been released, suffered only minor injuries.
Images released by the sheriff’s office showed firefighters using ropes and harnesses to scale the bridge and free the boy.
“I put him in a harness and pulled him all the way up,” Welander said.
Officials said the area is known for its deceptive geography and lack of respect for nature. Several warning signs are dotted near the canyon, including one that reads: “WARNING: Area around high railway bridge is slippery, steep and dangerous for exploring.”
“We have a lot of practice getting bodies out of here,” Welander said.
“It’s probably a 20-to-1 ratio.”
He noted that rescue teams have to travel to the area about three to five times a year to carry out rescues.
“Two of the people we rescued were actually deputy sheriffs, but they ended up being flown out because they were injured,” he said.
According to the WTA, the 685-foot-long truss arch bridge spans the South Fork of the Skokomish River in Mason County and is 365 feet above the river’s level.
