The Oregon State Police notified the Curry County Sheriff’s Office of a call regarding a person over the side of a cliff just after 11:30am, Wednesday morning, August 3rd, near Natural Bridges on Hwy. 101.
Sheriff’s Deputies and Search and Rescue members responded to the area as well as Cal Ore Life Flight Ambulance, Brookings and Cape Ferrelo Fire personnel.
An Oregon State Trooper in the area at the time, hiked down the trail and relayed that there was a young female who had slid about thirty-five yards down off a trail over the bluff and was complaining of leg pain, and that the Search and Rescue rope team would be needed.
Another female was discovered in need of rescue over the bluff after Deputies arrived on scene. The two victims, identified as 14 year old Claire Berndt and her mother, 49 year old Tara Berndt of Northfield Minnesota, were estimated to be just over one hundred feet below the trail, with her 49 year old mother about thirty feet below the trail.
Search and Rescue members arrived and set up rope systems and rappelled down to both the victims and were able to bring them both back to safety.
Afterwords, Claire Berndt told rescuers that she and her brother thought they could climb down from the trail to the beach below, but she started sliding and caught herself on some brush (poison oak) after sliding about fifty feet. There were six members of the Berndt family hiking the trails and after Claire had fallen, her mother Tara had climbed down the hill and attempted to reach her with a tow strap but found herself in a predicament as well.
Both Claire and her mother Tara were attended to by the Cal Ore ambulance crew after being brought back to the top of the trail by Search and Rescue members, but declined any medical assistance.
