Update 2 at 9:10 p.m. —
A college-aged male suffered multiple lacerations and was airlifted to a Syracuse hospital after falling about 60 feet onto the Cascadilla Gorge Trail Wednesday afternoon, according to the Ithaca Fire Department.
Dispatchers received a call around 5 p.m. after a passer-by found the person on the trail. He was semi-conscious when responders arrived.
The rescue occurred near where the trail runs under the Stewart Avenue Bridge. Bangs and firefighter crews brought the man to a landing zone near Ithaca High School, where a helicopter flew him to Upstate University Hospital.
The entire rescue took about an hour.
“Cornell PD is working on identifying the man and investigating the events leading up to the fall,” a statement said.
Update 1 —
Officials say the person found beneath the bridge is conscious and has been airlifted to Upstate University Hospital in Syracuse.
Lt. Thomas Basher said that the person was conscious when being taken to the hospital but is in “serious condition.”
“It appears that he fell from about 50 to 70 feet up, down from the trail,” Lt. Basher said.
Ithaca, N.Y. — Emergency responders are on scene at the gorge below the Stewart Avenue Bridge Wednesday afternoon.
The Tompkins County 911 Dispatch Center said it could only confirm that someone had fallen.
One set of emergency crews rushed along the gorge trail beneath the bridge.
Another crew of police and firefighters were on the bridge. A Cornell police officer using binoculars looked down below.
A person appeared to be visible beside the gorge. Responders arrived, loaded the person into a stretcher and then took the person down the gorge trail
Officials said the person would likely be airlifted to a hospital from a landing area near Ithaca High School.
A crowd of students stopped while walking across the bridge — which connects West Campus and Collegetown — to watch emergency crews work.
Some cried.
“It’s horrible, it’s horrible,” one woman said.
Police and firefighters have released no official details of what happened. We’ll provide updates when they do.