Climber Falls To His Death At Devils Tower Leaving Partner Stranded In A Horrifying Situation

If you’ve ever visited Devil’s Tower National Monument — or watched the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind — you know how the giant rock formation rises out of the ground and looms above the Wyoming landscape.

It’s massive, and people climb the thing.

Unfortunately, one of those climbing attempts ended in a horrifying tragedy Sunday.

According to the National Park Service, Stewart Phillip Porter, a 21-year-old from Eau Clare, Wisconsin, was rappelling down the 867-foot tower with a partner after reaching the summit. However, while he was preparing to descend the second pitch of the ominously named “El Cracko Diablo,” Porter suffered a fall.

Despite the name, the Associated Press describes that as a relatively easy route to the top of the massive geological formation, with Devils Tower National Monument Superintendent Doug Crossen saying Wednesday that the cause of the fall remains unknown but it is still being investigated.

A climber fell to his death, leaving his partner stranded at Devils Tower Natinoal Monument on Sunday. (Photo by: Bernard Friel/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

That’s obviously a terrible tragedy, but IU can’t get over the thought of being the partner stuck up on that giant rock.

Seriously. The thought of being up there after watching your friend fall makes my hands sweat.

Porter was found and pronounced dead at around 8:40 pm, while his climbing partner — who was not named — was found and brought to safety by a search and rescue team.

Devil’s Tower was the first national monument, and despite how scary it looks to climb, thousands do it every year and have been for over 100 years, even before it was a national monument with some scaling it as early as 1893. However, in that time, Porter’s death was only the seventh climbing death in the monument’s history.

Of those seven climbing fatalities, four of them occurred during the descent, just like Porter’s.