This article was originally published on page page 1 of Cape Times on August 07, 2007

By Caryn Dolley and Natasha Joseph

A spur of the moment decision to climb Table Mountain ended in tragedy when an American tourist's body was found on Monday, more than a day after he and his wife had taken separate paths planning to meet at the cable car.

After hours of searching in heavy rain and strong winds, rescuers found the body of David Andretta, 31, of Washington DC, at noon on Monday on the Upper Africa Ledge.

Rescuers had originally planned to bring his body down on Tuesday because of the bad weather, but after the rain stopped on Monday a team was sent to fetch him. His body was brought down on the cable car where it was met by his wife Melissa.

David and Melissa, both medical doctors, were on holiday in Cape Town and had planned to visit the Cape Winelands on Sunday, but as they were driving there they saw the mountain and decided to climb it instead.

"We walked up a path together and then at 11am I broke off to walk up Platteklip Gorge and he wanted to go to a section of rocks he could see and wanted to climb. We planned to meet at the top in an hour or, if not there, at the car," Andretta said on Monday from the Lower Cable Station an hour before her husband's body was found. She said he was an experienced climber.

She got to the top of the mountain two hours later and waited for David.

After a while she went to the car, waited a little longer and by 4pm realised something was wrong when he still hadn't arrived.

Andretta called Wilderness Search and Rescue (WSAR) who arrived shortly after and waited for a few hours to see if David would walk off the mountain with another tourist group. When he didn't turn up with them they started searching.

The search continued on Monday morning, with Andretta anxiously pacing up and down as she waited for news. Occasionally she would scan the mountain through binoculars.

She wept while describing to the search team what he was wearing - cargo pants and a long grey top.

As the rain started sheeting down and a thick mist covered the mountain she became withdrawn and was taken to the WSAR office for counselling.

More than 20 WSAR volunteers and a Woodstock inspector and sniffer dog had scoured the mountain on Monday morning. They were drenched and shivering and on their return huddled together drinking coffee and soup.

Rescue manager Anwaaz Bent said the rain and poor visibility had hampered the search effort.

He said, based on marks on his body when it was found, David had fallen and injured himself.

After the rescue team discovered David's body they returned and another team went up to cover it. The body was finally brought off the mountain around 7pm.

Andretta had wanted to go back to the mountain after she heard her husband was found dead, but she was advised to stay at the WSAR office because the weather was so terrible.

Andretta said they were to have left for Namibia on Tuesday.

The couple met while they were both studying at Georgetown University in 1995.

They had been married for less than a year.

Bent, speaking shortly after David's body had been brought down in the cable car, said that rescue teams were "exhausted "and that emotions were "running very high".

A witness said most of the rescuers had tears in their eyes.

David was the second hiker to die on a mountain in less than two days.

On Sunday, a 31-year-old Cape Town man fell to his death when he slipped on snow in the Matroosberg.

The man, named in media reports as Andrew Johns of Milnerton, plunged 450m into a ravine. Bad weather scuppered retrieval efforts on Monday.

Matroosberg Nature Reserve marketing manager Didi Greeff said retrieval teams would probably only enter the area "on Wednesday or Thursday".

Greeff said Johns had fallen "over the side of a canyon" and that his body was trapped "very deep" and was difficult to reach. She said it was "horrible" to think of Johns' body "lying in the rain".

"I can't even imagine what it's like for his family," said Greeff.

Cleeve Roberston, the head of Metro's emergency medical services in the Western Cape, said the retrieval operation would be "technically difficult". He said that about "five or six" Metro rescue operatives had completed alpine courses which would enable them to tackle snowy conditions up in the Matroosberg.

A rescue team was being put together, he said.

It seemed likely that operatives would be flown into the area and would then abseil down to Johns' body, said Robertson. Strong winds would make it "difficult" for small aircraft to enter the area.

Sources: iol