Dad Shielded Daughter in Deadly Rockslide

5 hikers dead in Colorado
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 1, 2013 12:43 AM CDT
Updated Oct 1, 2013 4:00 AM CDT
Rockslide Kills 5 Colo. Hikers
The deadly slide happened below Colorado's Mount Princeton.   (Wikipedia/Hogs555)

Five people were killed and a 13-year-old girl was seriously injured when a rockslide sent 100-ton boulders pouring onto a hiking trail in central Colorado. A deputy says the teen, the lone survivor from the group, told him her father jumped on top of her at the last minute to save her life as the rocks came down, ABC Denver reports. The dead have not been officially identified, but community members in nearby Buena Vista says the town's football coach, his wife, older daughter, and other family members are missing.

The rockslide—which left a large gash in the side of Mount Princeton—has left the area so unstable that rescuers were unable to recover the bodies yesterday, the AP reports. Engineers believe recent heavy rains loosened large boulders above a waterfall. When rescuers raced to the area, "the slope itself started moving downhill," a sheriff's department spokesman tells the Denver Post. "We had to get them out of there because the slope was sliding, and it was so unstable." The Agnes Vaille Falls trail, a popular beginners-level hike, is now likely to be closed permanently. (More Colorado stories.)

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