Vassar prof dies in climbing accident
JACKSON, WYO. » Investigators believe an improperly rigged belay device likely caused the 300-foot fall that killed a Vassar College professor on a popular Grand Teton National Park climbing route in northwest Wyoming.
Park rangers have not finished their report into the July 22 death of 33-yearold Marco Korstiaan Dees, who had homes in New Paltz and the Netherlands. And the Jackson Hole News & Guide reported rangers said they’ll never know for sure what happened. But Ranger Ryan Schuster said signs point toward Dees having made a rappelling mistake in rigging that resulted in a loose strand of rope pulling out of the belay device and through the anchor, causing Dees to fall.
Schuster said this type of mistake is elementary but can happen to anyone.
The News & Guide quoted Teton Park officials as saying Dees and his climbing partner, girlfriend Grace Mooney, were capable climbers who had appropriate gear. Mooney, a 2015 graduate of Vassar, was not injured but had to be rescued.
Dees was a first-year adjunct assistant professor of philosophy at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie and previously taught at Bard College in Annadale-on-Hudson, according to the Vassar website.
Vassar President Elizabeth H. Bradley posted on the site that Dees taught the classes “Reality, Knowledge & Morality” and “Logic” during the 2017-18 academic year.
Bradley said Dees “was at the start of what promised to be a full and productive career,” and she aid a memorial event will be held in the fall.
The Madison, Wis.-based news website madison.com reported that Mooney, a Madison native, learned rock climbing from Dees in the Hudson Valley.