A group of strangers who came across an injured Beverly Wedelstedt at the top of a 14,000 feet summit in the Rocky Mountains last Saturday, took turns hauling her over their shoulders all the way back down the mountain.
The 55-year-old woman was hiking the Gray’s Peak with friends when she felt her knee give and collapsed to the ground, Inside Edition reported.
Unable to put any weight on her knee, Wedelstedt realized she was not going to be able to descend the mountain on her own and, with nearly four miles to go, she started to panic.
“I’m just sitting there, and I’m freaking out because I’m sitting there thinking ‘How am I going to get down?’” she told KCNC-TV.
Fortunately, the trail seemed to be swarming with good Samaritans that day.
A group of strangers jumped into action and made her a makeshift splint to support her knee while two doctors who happened to be at the scene performed a quick evaluation and determined she had likely torn her ACL, Inside Edition noted.
Another stranger hiking the trail offered to carry Wedelstedt to the base of the mountain.
“One gentleman says, ‘I’m military. Are you comfortable doing a fireman carry? I’m going to throw you over my shoulder,’” she told Inside Edition. “I’m thinking, really nice kid, good looking, I weigh 160 pounds and he wants to do this? He’s like, ‘Yes, ma’am, I’m active military.’”
He slung her over his shoulders and began to carry her down when other hikers decided they wanted to assist.
“He walked for 200 yards, and then the other guys were all like, ‘We want to learn to do that,’” Wedelstedt told Inside Edition. “So they all learned from him and they all carried me, fireman style, 2.5 miles down that hill.”
Alpine Rescue volunteers met the group near the bottom and took over and carried her in a litter to safety.
“Thanks to the hikers on the Grays and Torrey's trail who assisted a lady with an injured knee until we could arrive with equipment to carry her out,” the rescue organization said in a Facebook post.
Wedelstedt will undergo surgery on her knee in a few weeks and is excited to get back to hiking as soon as she can, KCNC-TV said.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.