A 19-year-old man has escaped with minimal injuries after falling 400 feet into a canyon beneath the High Steel Bridge near Shelton, Washington.
The teen, unnamed by authorities, fell into the canyon on Saturday while walking in a washout that had been used by others. Authorities said it was too steep to be safe.
“He was walking down a washout that a lot of people use, and has kind of become a trail. It’s not a trail. It’s a washout, it’s too steep. And [he] ended up all the way down at the river, sliding,” West Mason Fire Chief Matthew Welander told Seattle NBC affiliate KING-TV.
The Mason County Sheriff’s Office was able to hoist him to safety, the agency posted on Facebook.
Law enforcement did not specify the nature of his injuries.
The area is extremely dangerous and the unnamed man is lucky to have made it out alive, authorities said.
“He was incredibly lucky … We get a lot of practice hauling dead bodies out of here. It’s probably a 20 to one ratio,” Chief Welander told KING-TV.
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