79-Year-Old Man Found Dead on Mt. Washington 2 Days After Straying From Summit

Officials say that a 79-year-old Florida man has been found deceased on the southeast side of New Hampshire’s Mt. Washington. William “Bill” Davis of Jacksonville, FL rode the Mt. Washington Cog Railway to the mountain’s summit with his wife on Wednesday before his disappearance triggered an extensive search. 

He was last seen alive around 3:20 p.m. that day near the observation deck, where the couple had snapped a photo together before Bill wandered off on a nearby trail. Davis’s wife reported him missing around 6 p.m. on Wednesday after he failed to return.

A state park employee was able to reach Bill Davis on his cell phone. Davis told the employee he was lost and described his surroundings, but his phone apparently lost power. Rescuers initially believed it would be easy to locate him, but after searching late into the night using foot patrols and drones, there was no sign of the missing man. 

The search continued throughout the day on Thursday and into Friday morning, eventually expanding to include more than 20 New Hampshire Fish and Game officers, rescuers from other agencies, and multiple Blackhawk helicopters.

Fish and Game officials told local New Hampshire news station WMUR shortly after 12 p.m. on Friday that they had found Davis’s body but did not release additional details or speculate on his cause of death.

Davis was not a hiker, having ridden to the summit by train, and authorities do not believe he was attempting to walk down the mountain. “He had no intention to hike, but for some reason he went off on the hiking trails, and no one knows why,” Fish and Game Lt. Mark Ober, Jr. said in an interview with WMUR. 

Conditions on Mt. Washington

Mt. Washington is one of the tallest peaks on the east coast. Although the 6,288-foot summit is accessible by road and railway, it is still considered one of the most dangerous mountains in the US and is notorious for its harsh and unpredictable weather conditions.

Preliminary time series data from the Mt. Washington Weather Observatory suggest that July 16th, the day Davis disappeared, was a mild, clear afternoon at the summit. But by Thursday morning, the data indicate that fog had reduced visibility at the summit to less than a tenth of a mile, and conditions deteriorated significantly by Thursday night, with temperatures dipping into the high 30s overnight, visibility remaining low, and the observatory clocking wind speeds as high as 75 miles per hour.

Featured image: Bill Davis on the summit of Mt. Washington shortly before his disappearance on Wednesday.