The Indiana man who fell to his death in Door County’s Peninsula State Park on Sunday was not on a designated trail, according to the Door County Sheriff’s Office.
Philip Miller, a 70 year-old man from Elkhart, Indiana was off-trail with his wife in the Eagle Terrace area of the park when he slipped off the cliff and fell 100 feet.
Miller had died before he could be rushed to a hospital.
Some hikers at the Peninsula State Park had heard about the incident, and were heartbroken that such a tragedy could happen in such a beautiful and peaceful area.
“Difficult to think you know you’re in this space and somebody had their last view of something beautiful hopefully,” Kathy Holl of Green Bay said. “So, you know, I hope there’s comfort for that family knowing that they were hopefully doing something they were enjoying.”
There are guardrails and barriers all over the park to protect hikers, but they run along the designated trails.
“That’s really heartbreaking to hear about anyone’s lost of life, especially in such a beautiful scenery, you’re looking to take a closer look at the things around you and the beauty and lose your life that way, it’s heartbreaking,” Marie Holl of Green Bay said.
Another park visitor who used to live in Baraboo said he heard about these types of incidents happen in a park near him.
“We come from Baraboo where Devil’s Lake Park is, and they have falls all the time off the bluffs, but that’s normally because somebody goes where they shouldn’t be, and they end up falling,” Paul Cade, who now lives in Chippewa Falls, said.
The Door County Sheriff’s Office said they do not believe Miller’s fall is suspicious.
