Overview
- Brian Seibert, 53, sent a final text saying he was descending Mount Morgan around 7 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 4, and was reported missing the next day when he failed to return to his vehicle.
- On Tuesday, Oct. 6, a Schooner search plane spotted an anomaly near the bottom of the east‑facing Grand Central Couloir that teams following a single set of footprints reached and identified as Seibert.
- Rescuers determined he suffered a fatal fall from a cliff ledge at the base of the couloir and could not complete a safe recovery that evening because the terrain blocked access.
- Yosemite National Park crews and Yosemite Search and Rescue completed a helicopter short‑haul recovery early the following morning, after a three‑day, multiagency operation that logged about 305 hours of search work.
- Investigators used photo‑topographic matching, cellphone forensics, K‑9 vehicle searches and high‑elevation deployment by a California National Guard CH‑47 to locate Seibert, underscoring how technical terrain raises the human and resource costs of remote mountain rescues.