Any info on climbing accident 10-23 Cotapaxi Co.? Kelly Riggins

The Pueblo Chieftan stated "inexperienced climber" Kelly Riggins fell 80 feet to his death,"victim did not have his rigging attached properly when he fell". This area is a "popular" area just off of Hwy 50 West of Cotapaxi. What area is this? Who was he climbing with? What actualy happened? My deepest reguard to family and friends.

Where is Shelf in relation to Cotopaxi? Saw this earlier and Shelf is the only popular area I could think of anywhere near there. Surely though if someone fell at Shelf, these forums wouldve been crawling with info about it yesterday.

Anything?

Cotapaxi is West of Canyon City ---- Shelf is North.

The climbing area is about a mile past Cotopaxi on the south side of US 50 about 40 miles west of Canon City. Mostly a bunch of topropes with a few scattered bolted routes on a steep 70-foot or so cliff. Easy to access.

I haven't heard anything more about the accident but it sounds like a tie-in problem. Condolences to the family for their loss.

He was a novice climber and made a series of mistakes that resulted in a fatal fall. In my opinion the fatal mistake and the only one that matters, was not testing the system before un-clipping from the safety
runner. That being said he was a good man and one can only speculate the how and whys of the event. For all that are interested the climbing area is just east of county Rd. 39 just about a mile or so west of Cotopaxi on the south side of the Rd.

Its across the hwy from a rapid called the black hole along the Arkansas just down stream from cottonwood rapid.