Re: Lawsuit over Rock Climber's death

Dismissal sought in Yosemite suit
Associated Press

FRESNO - The National Park Service is seeking dismissal of a lawsuit that alleges Yosemite National Park was negligent in the death of an experienced climber who was killed by a rockfall.

The parents of Peter Terbush, 22, filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit in 2001 seeking $10 million in damages.

Terbush, a student at Western State College, in Gunnison, Colo., was climbing with two friends 240 feet above Curry Village, a combination of visitor cabins and duplexes, when he was killed by a falling rock in June 1999. .....

http://www2.dailynews.com/news/ci_3276460

If allowed to go forward, this kind of suit can have a chilling effect on what kind of activities are allowed in the park. A sign would have done nothing to stop this death and nobody except the lawyers will win.

It's certainly too bad when someone gets injured or killed in Yosemite or any other wild place.

But I hope we never have to put up signs every 50 feet warning people of potential dangers.

The beauty of Yosmite and places like it (at least to me) is knowing that Nature is big, grand, AND powerful. It's there to test my strength, my brain, and sometimes even my will. Yosemite has shown me my limitations at times, but it has also inspired me to heights beyond my imagination - both literally and figuratively.

Even with signs up at Nevada and Vernal Falls warning people of the dangers of the Merced River, every few years someone is swept over one of those falls to their death. I belive two or three people were killed that way in 2005. Signs are not the answer for situations like this. Rocks have fallen for thousands of years in Yosemite and you don't need signs to realize it's always possible one might fall on you.

I imagine Peter Terbush would tell his family that he knew what he was doing on that granite wall, the risks inherent, and he would tell them to drop their suit. Signs, or no signs, I believe he would have been on that mountain that day. I'm sure part of what he loved was the risk involved in rock climbing. Take all the potential risks away and you might as well climb a "rock wall" at your local YMCA.

Most of my elderly relatives and acquaintances have died in a nursing home or in a hospital. When it's my time to go, I would rather it be in Yosemite or somewhere along the John Muir Trail.

My family would not be suing anyone, because they know how much Yosemite has meant to me. I feel badly for Peter's family, but I hope they don't change the way we are allowed to experience this wonderful place.

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Bill