The man who died July 2 in a climbing accident in Fremont County was a renowned long-distance skier and Czech athlete, according to media reports.
A Fremont County coroner’s docket report dispatched to Cowboy State Daily on Thursday identifies the deceased climber as Jiři Pliska.
Pliska, 42, died of excessive blunt force trauma due to an accidental fall, the report says.
He was a Czech Pro Team athlete, the Ski Classics sports league says in a statement mourning Pliska.
The statement says Pliska was rappelling when he died July 2 in the Wind River Range.
He was in the Cirque of the Towers area, according to a Fremont County Sheriff’s Office statement.
Search and Rescue crews found Pliska at about 9 a.m. July 4.
“We are all painfully paralyzed by this unexpected tragedy,” reads an English translation of the Ski Classics statement.
Pliska won the Czech Ski Association’s Climb of the Year award in 2013 for climbing the west face of Uzum Brakk, a mountainous glacier in Pakistan.
“He was one of the best Czech athletes in Ski Classics in (recent) years,” reads the statement, calling him “a naturally tough guy who was unafraid to stand up for the weak,” and “an honest man who lived his wife and could support his loved ones.”
