Siblings' bodies are found on Peru peak

The siblings were experienced climbers who always took precautions before trekking into the wilderness, friends and co-workers said Monday.

But something went terribly wrong last week as the climbers, both graduates of Tucson's Sabino High School, took what may have been just a practice hike to acclimate themselves to the Andes Mountains, reaching some 17,000 feet above sea level.

Their bodies were discovered in a 100-foot-deep ice crevice in Peru on Sunday.

"From what I know, it was a freak thing. They weren't doing an ascent; they were just getting used to the elevation," said Gary Branges, the manager of Peace Surplus in Flagstaff, where both Dustin and Kristen worked.

"It was a warm-up. They didn't have all their gear with them. It was at the base camp — that's what I heard," Branges said.

"What happened I don't know and I wouldn't want to speculate. But Dustin is one to totally plan a trip and then talk to 12 people. He knew his limitations and was not a risk taker. This was the big brother taking his little sister on her first major trip."

The bodies of Kristen, 21, Dustin, 23, and Brigham Young University student Brennan Larson, 24, were found by a 15-member rescue team on Sunday afternoon in a crevice on the Artensonraju peak, said police Maj. Edmundo Vidal of the High Mountain Rescue Unit. They'd been missing since last week. Larson's family said he'd met the Yoders at a base camp. He was a geology student about to start his senior year at BYU.

The siblings' parents, Kathy and Dr. Ken Yoder, a surgeon, flew to Peru over the weekend to help in the search.

Both Kristen and Dustin were accomplished athletes. At Sabino, both played soccer, and Kristen was a star cross-country runner who earned spots on the Arizona Daily Star's All-Southern Arizona high school teams.

An experienced hiker and backpacker, Kristen led trips for Northern Arizona University, said her supervisor, Andy Bourget, coordinator of NAU Outdoors. Kristen, a parks and recreation major at NAU who expected to graduate in 2007, recently earned accolades for helping a distressed hiker reconnect with his group. She came upon the hiker while leading a group through the Grand Canyon, according to a Nov. 23 article in Inside NAU.

The article also said Kristen had completed two intensive guide training programs as part of becoming a trip leader and had been through Wilderness First Responder Training. That 76-hour program includes preparation for medical emergencies in the wilderness or in developing countries, with emphasis on prevention, early intervention and cultivating good judgment in problem-solving.

"She was just an extremely friendly person, one of the happiest, nicest people I've ever met," Bourget said. "She was one of our best trip leaders, and very experienced in backpacking."

Dustin graduated from NAU in December and had worked at Peace Surplus throughout college, Branges said. He was very much the protective big brother and helped his younger sister get a job at the store when she moved to Flagstaff.

Dustin had been helping his father build a cabin on the north side of the San Francisco Peaks near Flagstaff. More recently, he took a leave from his job at Peace Surplus to join his father in South America, where he was working with Doctors Without Borders, a medical humanitarian group.

The siblings were part of a tight group of outdoor and environmental enthusiasts in Flagstaff who nearly always rode their bicycles to their jobs. Branges said he'd never seen Kristen driving a vehicle.

"They were just wonderful people," he said.

According to a résumé that Kristen posted on NAU's Web site, mountaineering and rock climbing were her passions. She nearly made it to the summit of 20,320-foot Mount McKinley — Alaska's highest mountain — with her brother and father before bad weather kept them from going to the top, she wrote.

She hoped eventually to lead wilderness trips outside the United States.

"I have researched the job availability in this area of study and the possibilities are limitless," she wrote. "I only hope someday I can teach and inspire kids to appreciate the outside world as much as I do."

The three bodies were being recovered Monday in a long descent down the mountain, which was expected to last into the night, Vidal told The Associated Press by telephone from the squad's headquarters in Yungay, about 200 miles north of the capital of Lima.

The glacier-covered mountain the three had hoped to climb is in the Cordillera Blanca range in the Andes. Officials said they were on a fairly treacherous route without a guide.

Vidal said the cause of the accident was unknown. Perhaps they did not take the proper safety precautions, "or it could have been an avalanche that swept them down," he said.

Kathy Yoder thanked Peruvian authorities Sunday for helping her search for her children, shortly after arriving in Yungay. She was not available for comment Monday. A woman who answered the telephone at the family's Tucson home declined to comment.