JUNEAU, Alaska -- The third and final British climber missing on Alaska's Mount McKinley was rescued Friday, a day after his frostbitten companions were plucked off the upper slopes of the nation's tallest peak, the National Park Service said.
Steve Ball, 42, of Staffordshire, was found Friday afternoon, about 24 hours after he left the other two in search of help, the Park Service said.Ball had been the least injured of the three when he began his descent Thursday afternoon in the direction of a park ranger camp at the 14,200-foot.
But he never made it to the ranger camp, said Park Service spokesman John Quinley. A search crew found him Friday afternoon at about the 17,500-foot level.
Ball was dehydrated, hypothermic and suffering from an open fracture of his leg, the product of a fall from 18,200-foot Denali Pass, Quinley said.
The volunteer searchers, a party of five climbers, including a Canadian doctor, stayed with Ball until he was lifted by helicopter to a lower level of the mountain, Quinley said. From there, he was flown to an Anchorage hospital.
Nigel Vardy, 29, of Derbyshire, and Antony Hollinshead, 33, of Shropshire, were flown off Thursday night about 800 feet from the summit of the 20,320-foot peak, the tallest in North America, the Park Service said.