The remains of a missing Calgary hiker who fell into Twin Falls in Yoho National Park last year have been recovered about 500 metres from the base of the falls, according to his mom.
Jeremy Prendergast, 19, slipped into the 80- to 100-metre high waterfall on Sept. 13, 2015.
Jeremy Prendergast, 19, fell over Twin Falls in Yoho National Park in September. He was found at the end of April.
“On April 28, I was informed that remains were recovered 500 metres from the base of the fall,” said Predergast’s mom, Theresa Lavorato-Prendergast in an e-mail early Saturday. “They believed they were Jeremy’s.
“Yesterday I received confirmation that it is definitely him from a DNA sample I supplied on May 4.”
Lavorato-Prendergast called it the “best worst news for me after eight-and-a-half months of hell and not knowing.”
In the days after Prendergast fell, Parks Mountain Safety teams searched on the ground and in the air, recovering some of his clothing and his shoes partway down the waterfall.
They scaled back the search on Sept. 16, but continued searching every few days with a helicopter. They also installed a satellite-triggered camera to watch the site remotely.
In November, the falls froze over and the search was called off until spring.
No one from Parks Mountain Safety could immediately be reached for comment, but they said in an earlier interview that they would return in the April or May before the water levels got too high.
There’s been at least one other person who went over Twin Falls back in the 1980s — and the body was never found.
