Diem Le Nguyen smiled and posed holding a peace sign next to the Black Mountain Peak elevation sign in San Diego County, his hat and sunglasses shielding him from the morning sun. Twenty-four hours later, his body was found on a trail just off the streets of the foothills community in eastern San Diego County.
Now, Nguyen’s family, friends and people who traveled with him last week are wondering how things went so wrong.
“Our family is deeply saddened by the tragic and unexpected loss of our mother, Diem Le Nguyen. We are struggling to accept this new reality,” Nguyen’s three sons said in a statement.
“We knew she reached the summit with everyone else,” said Jimmy Thai, who organized the hike and broadcast Nguyen’s summit on June 23.
Nguyen, 50, joined her sister and nephew and more than 150 other people on a 5-kilometer hike Sunday morning to raise money for a local nonprofit. About halfway up the mountain, her family turned back and she continued to the summit with the rest of the group.
The walk was an annual pledge event to support the Build a School Foundation, which supports school construction in remote areas around the world for underprivileged children, and involved 150 to 200 people hiking up Black Mountain in eastern San Diego County.
Thai said the organizers plan the annual hike very carefully. They start early in the morning to avoid extreme heat, provide safety information, provide food and water, and mark the route with red ribbons and white flowers tied to trees. Thai said volunteer cleaners followed the group to make sure no one was left behind.
This trail, which begins at the edge of Hilltop Community Park, is a narrow, rocky trail with bushes surrounding it. Several paths branch off from the main hike to nearby trails. It is considered a moderate difficulty hike by the hike ranking website Alltrails.com.
Signs near the start of the trail warn hikers of wild animals, such as rattlesnakes, which seek shade during the day and are more active at night.
Nighthawk Trailhead in San Diego County.
(Sandra McDonald/Los Angeles Times)
On Sunday, a bouquet of flowers was placed at the trailhead in memory of Nguyen.
“The day felt normal, just like any other trip we organize. Exactly the same route, the same mountain that we have been doing over and over again,” Thai said.
But according to the National Weather Service, the day was unusually hot. The county issued a heat warning that was in effect from 10 a.m. on June 22 to 8 p.m. on June 23. The organization distributed black heart-shaped shirts, the same shirt Nguyen wore in the photo next to the elevation sign.
By 9:15 a.m., just minutes after Nguyen was spotted at the summit, the temperature had reached 98 degrees at the top of Black Mountain, which is more than 1,500 feet above sea level, National Weather Service meteorologist Brandt Maxwell said. Temperatures were in the 80s on the way to the summit and never dropped below 67 degrees overnight.
Thai said a volunteer sweeper spotted Nguyen about a quarter-mile downstream after returning from the summit, which was the last known sighting of him alive.
At 10:08 a.m., Nguyen called her sister from her cellphone, saying she was tired and needed water, police said at a news conference last week. Nguyen’s nephew and another hiker climbed back up again in hopes of finding her, but were unsuccessful.
He said that at about 10:30 a.m., when the climb was about to end, Nguyen’s sister told Thai that her brother had not come down the mountain. They showed a photo of Nguyen to Thai’s team and went back up the mountain in the heat to look for other routes.
“I have it in my mind that we will run into him. There’s no doubt about it,” Thai told the Times in an interview. “We know that very well. These are well-marked trails. There are people, other hikers,” who will eventually run into Nguyen, he thought.
Flowers were laid at the Nighthawk Trailhead in memory of Diem Le Nguyen, who died last week after becoming separated from his hiking group.
(Sandra McDonald/Los Angeles Times)
Maxwell said the day Nguyen went missing on the mountain, the skies were clear, the wind was light, and the humidity was high, which would have made it difficult to keep the body cool. people become overheated and are unable to cool themselves In fact, they could suffer a variety of side effects, ranging from cramps and rashes to heat exhaustion and heatstroke, a potentially fatal condition that can include dizziness, difficulty breathing or passing out, according to the San Diego County Health and Human Services Agency.
The group reported Nguyen missing to police at 11:30 a.m. on June 23. Authorities deployed three helicopters, a ground crew and sniffer dogs to search for him day and night.
Thai told Nguyen’s family, “Stay calm, we are with you. But rest assured, with all these resources, we will find your sister.”
For several hours after Nguyen disappeared, Thais livestreamed police helicopters flying overhead while he and other volunteers searched nearby trails.
At one point, the group of volunteers helping search for Nguyen grew so large that police decided they would hinder the search by distracting search dogs and turning off infrared cameras used to search for Nguyen in the dark.
“Honestly, I started to get worried at that point because I knew it had been more than 12 hours,” Thai said. “If someone gets heatstroke and dehydration, even if we find them, the outcome might not be good.”
The next morning, Thai and the search party returned to resume the search at 5 a.m. When they returned to regroup hours later, police were waiting for them with bad news—they had found a body east of the trailhead at about 9 a.m., just a quarter-mile from the intersection of Carmel Mountain Road and Via Rimini at the base of the mountain.
The San Diego County medical examiner’s office confirmed Wednesday that the body was that of Nguyen, but the cause of death had not been released until Monday.
“His legacy will always be with us, because this is how the universe brings him to us and guides us to keep doing this. Do more hikes, build more schools and help more children,” Thai said.
“Our mother was kind and selfless, and our family will always cherish the memories we have of her. We remember her for her resilience and hope to carry on her legacy,” the family said in a statement.
In an interview after Nguyen’s body was discovered, San Diego Police Department Public Information Officer Lt. Daniel Meyer said, abc 10 news Hikers should make a plan for the summer months, including not hiking alone and bringing enough water for the trip.
