Longs Peak Deaths: How Many Have Died, Where, and Why

Longs Peak has killed more people than any other mountain in Colorado. Exact counts vary by source and by where you start the clock, but credible estimates put the number of Longs Peak deaths somewhere between about 60 and more than 70, with the first recorded fatality in 1884. Roughly 70 percent of those deaths were falls. That record is why Rocky Mountain National Park stopped calling the standard route "non-technical" and why rangers tell people a slip in the wrong spot can kill you.

None of that means you can't climb it. Thousands of hikers summit Longs every summer and walk back down fine. But the mountain is honest about what it is, and the people who get hurt almost always made one of a short list of mistakes. This page covers how many have died, where on the route it happens, why the descent is the dangerous half, and what the accident record tells you about coming home.

What you'll learn

• How many people have died on Longs Peak
• Why the mountain is so dangerous
• Where people die on the Keyhole Route
• Why the descent kills more people than the climb
• Weather, lightning, and ice
• Who gets in trouble up here
• How to not become a statistic
• FAQs

How many people have died on Longs Peak? {#how-many}

There is no single official running total, which is part of why you'll see different numbers everywhere. Rocky Mountain National Park does not publish a tidy fatality counter for the peak, and sources disagree on where the count begins and what to include.

Here's the range, with sources:

• A 2016 tally compiled by mountaineering writer Alan Arnette put the figure at about 62, with falls making up roughly 60 percent of the deaths.
• A 2025 Denver Gazette feature reported about 67 fatalities associated with Longs Peak, around 70 percent of them from falls, and noted that even that figure left out some recent years.
• Several outlets from 2023 onward describe the mountain as having claimed "more than 70" lives since Rocky Mountain National Park was established.

Put those together and the honest answer is this: somewhere in the 60s to low 70s, climbing steadily, with the great majority caused by falls. The first death on record is usually dated to 1884, when Carrie Welton died of exhaustion and exposure coming down from the summit. One of the route's stone shelters near the Keyhole is named for Agnes Vaille, who died in January 1925 after a winter climb of the east face; the man who went to help her, Herbert Sortland, died too. You walk past that history on the way up.

For scale, Longs sees something on the order of 15,000 summit attempts a year, and only about half of those parties top out. So the death rate per attempt is low. The problem is that the absolute number of people exposed to the hazard is high, and the hazard is real.

Why the mountain is so dangerous {#why-dangerous}

Longs Peak is the only fourteener inside Rocky Mountain National Park, and its standard line, the Keyhole Route, is a Class 3 scramble, not a hike. The summit sits at 14,259 feet. The round trip runs about 15 miles with roughly 5,100 feet of gain, and most people are on the mountain 10 to 15 hours. Our complete Keyhole Route guide walks the whole thing section by section if you want the climbing detail.

The park used to label routes "technical" or "non-technical." It dropped that language on purpose. As the NPS puts it, the ratings are subjective, and "non-technical" should never be read as "safe." The last 1.5 miles, from the Keyhole to the summit, are described by the park as "by far the most difficult, exposed and hazardous portion of the route." Up there you're crossing steep rock faces and narrow ledges, scrambling on all fours, and exposed to rockfall and to weather that can turn in minutes. Snow and ice can show up any month of the year.

The short version: this is a long day at serious altitude on exposed Class 3 terrain where a single bad step has nowhere to go but down. That combination is rare among Colorado's easier-sounding fourteeners, and it catches people who picked Longs as a "next 14er" without reading what changes after the Keyhole.

Where people die on the Keyhole Route {#where}

The deaths cluster in a few specific places, and they're the same places that feel hardest while you're standing in them. The breakdown below comes from Arnette's climber-compiled tally rather than official park data, so treat the exact counts as approximate, but the pattern matches what rangers and climbers describe.

• The Ledges. Right after the Keyhole, the route traverses a series of narrow ledges above a long drop, following red-and-yellow bull's-eyes painted on the rock. Arnette's tally attributes about six fatal falls here. Lose the bull's-eyes and you're off-route and into worse terrain fast.
• The Trough. A long, loose gully that climbs roughly 600 feet. The danger here is rockfall, usually knocked loose by other climbers above you, plus snow and black ice that linger in the shade well into summer. A helmet earns its weight in this section.
• The Narrows. A thin shelf of rock over a sheer face, and one of the most exposed moves on the route. Arnette counts about five fatal falls here. In 2016 a 61-year-old hiker slipped on ice in the Narrows and fell 100 to 150 feet; other climbers that day described the route as frosted and iced with snow in the Trough.
• The Homestretch. The final slabs to the summit, smooth granite you pull yourself up by hand and foot. It's deceptively grippy when dry and treacherous when wet or iced, which it often is early and late in the day.
• The Diamond. The sheer east face, the dramatic wall you see from the meadow below. This is a roped technical climbing venue, not part of the Keyhole Route, and it has its own fatal falls, around eight in Arnette's count. Most Keyhole hikers never go near it, but it's part of why the mountain's overall toll runs high.

Why the descent kills more people than the climb {#descent}

If there's one fact worth carrying up the mountain, it's this: the NPS says most accidents on the Keyhole Route happen on the way down. The park blames two things, and they feed each other.

The first is fatigue. By the time you turn around, you've been moving for hours, you're dehydrated, and your legs are cooked. Tired people place their feet worse and catch themselves slower. The second is what the park calls the false assumption that "I've done the hardest part." You summit, the pressure comes off, your attention drops, and the Homestretch and Narrows are still below you. The park's word for the mindset that gets people killed is blunt: "Summit fever is dangerous."

Descending also tempts people to shortcut. The route down the Ledges and Trough is slow and feels indirect, so hikers eye a faster-looking line and leave the bull's-eyes. The park's advice is to stop the moment the markers disappear and retrace your steps to the last one you saw. GPS won't save you here; the park specifically warns against trusting technology to show the route through this terrain. A good headlamp matters for the same reason, because a slow descent can run into dark. Our headlamp roundup covers what to look for.