ROSE - DOUGLAS - Bar Harbor

DOUGLAS ROSE - Acadia National Park

In Oct. 1993 a rock climbing adventure ended in tragedy Tuesday night when a 20 year old College of the Atlantic student died after he became trapped in a sea cave on the side of a cliff at Acadia National Park, adding yet another name to the growing list of deaths in the park.  The accident occurred at Schooner Head Overlook at a popular cave named Anemone Cave.
Rangers speculated that extreme cold temperatures, pounding rain, assaultive winds and high tide prevented Douglas Rose from climbing up the face of the cliff to safety, and that he may have drowned.  They said the cave could be reached only by the climbing rope he had descended down just hours before.
Rescuers and a 40 foot U.S. Coast Guard boat rushed to the scene.  "So last night, in the blackest of downpours and with the wind howling like a hurricane...a member of the Mount Desert Island search and Rescue was able to climb down the rope to a point where he could see into the cave.  He could see that Rose was tethered on a rope and pretty much free-floating in the surf and face down," Dodge said.  "He made a determination he was dead."
Rescue efforts were halted until 6a,m, Wednesday.
"This time a ranger climbed down and was able to pendulum-swing into the cave.  He got within 15 to 20 feet of the body when the surf really picked up.  He was completely submerged two or three times and we had to pull him up," Dodge said.