Man dies after falling into hot spring at Yellowstone National Park

A man has died after falling into a hot spring at Yellowstone National Park in the US state of Wyoming. Colin Nathaniel Scott, 23, of Portland, Oregon, was with his sister and had walked more than 200 yards away from the designated boardwalk when he slipped and fell into the acidic hot spring in the Norris Geyser Basin, park officials said. His sister reported his fall and rangers tried to navigate the highly-fragile crust of the geyser basin to recover his body, but they have now suspended efforts “due to the extreme nature and futility of it all”.

They were able to recover a few personal effects. There were no remains left to recover.

Spokeswoman from the park

Mr Scott’s death occurred in one of the hottest and most volatile areas of the park. It comes after a number of incidents in which tourists have left the designated path. "It’s sort of dumb, if I could be so blunt, to walk off the boardwalks not knowing what you’re doing,“ said Professor Kenneth Sims, a member of the Yellowstone Volcano Observatory. Mr Scott himself was described as "a very nice young man, a bright spirit” by a former manager. Signs are posted throughout the park, warning people to keep to the designated trails in thermal areas which feature boiling pools, geysers that can blast hundreds of feet into the air and toxic gases. The crust that makes up the ground in parts of Yellowstone is formed when underground minerals dissolved by the high-temperature water are redeposited on or near the surface.

Yellowstone