Remains of 3 removed from Mount Rainier

PARADISE — Nearly 30 years after a small plane crashed into Mount Rainier, the remains of three men have been removed from where they were entombed on the mountain.

Park rangers used a helicopter Thursday to recover the men’s remains and the wreckage of a small plane believed to be theirs. Hot, dry weather that melted snow and ice allowed the recent discoveries.

Pilot Bill Steitz of Fresno, Calif., and passengers Dean Bride of Puyallup and Kenneth Fry of Sacramento, Calif., were aboard a single-engine plane that crashed Jan. 13, 1972, as it flew from Pasco to Seattle.

Marlene Nelson, Bride’s daughter, compared her family’s prolonged wait for information to what others must endure after last week’s attacks on the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and the World Trade Center in New York.

Hiker Stefan Lofgren, a former climbing ranger on Mount Rainier, found the wreckage Tuesday on Cowlitz Glacier on the southeast flank of the mountain. Since 1965, 23 people have been killed in plane crashes on the mountain.

Fires burn in the Cascade range: Weekend lightning strikes started several fires on the east slopes of the Cascades, including a 500-acre blaze in the Wenatchee National Forest and a 350-acre fire in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest. Fire had burned 500 acres near Entiat on Tuesday, said Robin DeMario, a spokeswoman for the Wenatchee National Forest. Three smaller fires covered less than 20 acres, she said. No injuries or damage was reported, but campgrounds were evacuated. Air tankers loaded with fire retardant and helicopters loaded with water worked Tuesday to try to control the 350-acre Salt Creek fire in the Mount Adams Wilderness Area. The fire was burning north of Trout Lake, said Linda Turner, a Gifford Pinchot National Forest spokeswoman.

Burned firefighter to get out of hospital: The U.S. Forest Service firefighter who was severely burned in the deadly Thirty-mile fire will be released from Seattle’s Harborview Medical Center on Thursday. "I’m doing really good," said Jason Emhoff, 21, who will return to his home in Yakima for continued physical therapy. Emhoff has been hospitalized since July 10, when he was trapped with 13 other firefighters and two campers by the fire in the Chewuch River canyon in the Okanogan National Forest. In an unusual procedure, doctors tucked Emhoff’s left hand into his abdomen for three weeks to help heal blood vessels before proceeding with skin grafts. He has greater use of his right hand, which was also badly burned, although he lost the little finger.

Identifying crash victims may take time: It may take days or weeks to identify the remains of all 16 Seattle-area victims killed in the crash of a sightseeing plane last week in Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, U.S. State Department officials say. Charles Luoma-Overstreet, U.S. consul in Merida, Mexico, said Mexican officials have identified eight of the victims: Lois Mitchell, 60, and her husband, Dwight Mitchell, 64, of Oak Harbor; Mary Kearney, 57, of Oak Harbor; Ted Zylstra, 67, of Oak Harbor; Larry Schwab, 50, of Auburn; Judy Wade, 58, of Seattle; Shirley Genther, 75, of Seattle; and Scott Columbia, 44, of Renton. The pilot of the plane, a Mexican citizen, also has been identified. All 16 passengers, the pilot and two other crew members were killed when the aircraft crashed and burned Wednesday while on a trip to view the Mayan ruins at Chichen Itza.