Dead climber directs recovery team to girlfriend’s body

An accomplished climber who took his own life after his girlfriend died in a southwestern Montana avalanche left directions to lead a recovery team to her body.

The parents of 27-year-old Hayden Kennedy of Carbondale, Colorado said he survived Saturday’s avalanche, but “not the unbearable loss of his partner in life,” 23-year-old Inge Perkins of Bozeman.

Doug Chabot with the Gallatin National Forest Avalanche Center says Kennedy did not call 911 to report the slide. His body was found Sunday in Bozeman.

Chabot says Kennedy left an “incredibly detailed and well-thought-out note” that included the GPS coordinates of where the slide happened.

Just two weeks earlier, Kennedy had written on a climbing blog that he had watched too many friends die in the mountains over the last few years.