Louisville climber killed

[Rhya]

Guys and Gals:

It sucks to be the one to report this, but I have not seen anything on it yet in the forum. (I am sorry if it is already listed--I am not 100% sure)

Prayers and thoughts go out to the family of Drew. He was a fine man, and A TON of people knew him.

Courier Journal----Local News Tuesday, May 24, 2005


Atherton graduate dies in fall while climbing in Canada
Location 150 miles from populated area

Drew Wilson, 24, was photographed during a climb in Mexico. Wilson, a 1999 graduate of Atherton High School, died after a fall Thursday in the Nunavut Territory of northern Canada.

By Jessie Halladay
jhalladay@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal



Drew Wilson's parents know very little about the details of their son's death while rock climbing in Canada near the Arctic Circle.

What they do know is that he died doing something he was passionate about.

"He truly loved what he did," said his mother, Dr. Kate Wilson, who now lives in Salt Lake City. "He just went for it and never left anything behind."

Wilson, 24, a 1999 graduate of Louisville's Atherton High School, died after a fall Thursday in the Stewart Valley in the Nunavut Territory of northern Canada.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police are still investigating the incident, a spokesman said. The other members of the expedition have not yet left the area, which is about 150 miles north of Baffin Island's Clyde River community, the nearest populated place. Wilson's body has not been brought out either.

Wilson left at the end of April for the expedition with three other climbers and a doctor, said his father, Scott Wilson, a Louisville attorney who has not yet moved to Utah to join his family. The Wilsons also have an older son and a younger daughter.

On Friday, Scott Wilson received a call from a constable in Clyde River who told him that his son had died while climbing. The other climbers had managed to reach authorities by satellite telephone, Wilson said.

Not wanting to accept the story, he called back to verify that it wasn't a prank.

"It's hard to believe it's true," Wilson said.

Yet, he said, he always understood the dangers of the adventures his son undertook.

Drew Wilson started to climb as a teenager. He had scaled El Capitan in Yosemite National Park and rock faces all over the country.

Scott Wilson said climbing became his son's passion. "He confronted fears and overcame those," his father said.

After high school, Drew Wilson would periodically attend classes at the University of Louisville, but often took sabbaticals to climb.

The journey north was a first for him -- an attempt to scale a rock face that is rarely climbed and a first attempt to climb in subfreezing temperatures. For several months, he planned the climb with the other four members of the team, which included a cousin.

To get to the climbing site, Wilson said, his son expected a journey of two to three days, the final leg by snowmobile or dog sled.

Although his parents worried, they wished him luck, Scott Wilson said.

"He had been challenged and met challenges. We knew he was strong. There was no stopping him."

Andrew Cook, a friend from Atherton, said Drew Wilson had been excited about making the trek north and embraced this challenge, as he had many others, with complete vigor and energy.

"He was one of those people that you felt alive around," Cook said.

And climbing was an intense love for him.

"When he gets on rock," Cook said, "it's just like poetry, beautiful to watch."

A memorial service has been scheduled for 5 p.m. Saturday at the Atherton soccer field.