Fatal Machu Picchu Selfie: Man Falls Of Cliff And Dies Posing For Picture


Tragedy struck Machu Picchu recently, in the unlikely form of “death by selfie.” Unfortunately, a 51-year-old male tourist from Germany lost his life on June 29 while posing for a photograph at the World Heritage Site in Peru. Machu Picchu is the ancient Incan citadel that has made the region of Peru a world-famous tourist destination.

According to a Fox News report, the fatal Machu Picchu selfie took the life of Oliver Park after he sneaked into a restricted area of the popular Andes tourist draw. Reportedly, the restricted area that Park ventured into was marked with signs telling curious tourists to stay away from the edge of the cliff, but apparently the German tourist disregarded the warnings. He allegedly asked a fellow tourist to snap a picture of him as he stood on the edge of the cliff, despite the warnings at Machu Picchu.

That’s when things turned deadly, according to Peruvian tourist Guillermo Mestas.

“He asked a man who was there to take a photo of him.”

The 51-year-old German then lost his footing and fell to his death, roughly 130 feet off of the edge of the cliff.

“The man came over to take the photo and in the moment he was handing him the camera, he lost his balance and fell.”

While this is the “official” version of the unfortunate fatal Machu Picchu pose, another report from the BBC contradicts this account. In the BBC version of events, the German tourist didn’t just slip and fall during his fatal Machu Picchu photo attempt. Rather, according to that rendition of the deadly incident, the man attempted to “pose” for his selfie by leaping in the air near the edge of the cliff, with fatal consequences.

Following the 130-foot fall from the edge of the Machu Picchu cliff, local Peruvian authorities had to undertake the arduous and difficult task of recovering Park’s body from the steep mountainside. After the recovery, the remains of the German tourist were reportedly taken from Machu Picchu by train to a Peruvian morgue in Cusco.

While tragic, the fatal Machu Picchu selfie is not nearly the only recent death attributed to people trying to snap the perfect pic.

The same week as the fatal Machu Picchu selfie incident, and also in Peru, a tourist from South Korea also suffered a selfie-related falling death. In that incident, the tourist was trying to take a selfie in a popular area of the Amazon rainforest. He died after falling off of the Gocta falls, a drop of roughly 1,600 feet.

In 2015, a tourist from Japan suffered a fatal selfie-related fall at the Taj Mahal. That tourist reportedly took a tumble down some stairs while attempting to snap a selfie.

A Washington state man also reportedly died in March while trying to take a selfie. In that incident, the victim didn’t fall; instead, he is said to have shot himself in the face. How? He was taking a selfie with a gun he thought was empty.

Machu Picchu is a very popular tourist destination, but it’s also very remote and can be dangerous for the unprepared or unwary. It is over 8,000 feet above sea level, and the famous ruins themselves (the reason for the flocking tourists) are located on a steep, high ridge. The views that reward those who persevere and make it to the site are breathtaking, and offer an unmatched perspective of the Sacred Valley below. The Sacred Valley, overlooked by Machu Picchu, is fully 2,000 feet below the ruins, and it is home to the Urubamba River.

Over a million tourists visited the ancient Incan city of Machu Picchu in 2014.

Machu Picchu was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the early 1980s, well before people had to worry about the prospects of a fatal selfie.

[Image by Shutterstock]

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