Hiker, 25, Missing On Mount Rainier

Weather cleared around Mount Rainier Monday, allowing rescuers to use a helicopter to help search for a 25-year-old California man who was reported missing high on the peak, National Park Service officials said.

Nicholas Giromini, of Petaluma, Calif., reached the summit of the 14,410-foot mountain Saturday. He was descending when he and his partner, Mark Moyer, also of Petaluma, apparently became lost and separated.

Moyer met other climbers with a cell phone at Camp Muir and called for help.

The climbers separated at about the 12,500-foot level. Two rangers were searching Monday for Giromini out of Camp Muir, which is at 10,000 feet. Other searchers stood by at the Longmire ranger station farther down the mountain.

“We’re just hoping we can get to him,” chief ranger John Krambrink said Sunday. “People have been known to survive on Mount Rainier in severe weather by digging in and being properly prepared.”

However, “the fellow that is out there is very poorly equipped to survive, we believe,” he said.

The climbers did not register for the climb as park regulations require, nor did they carry packs or survival gear, the Park Service said.