By Carl Prine
Pittsburgh Tribune Review
PITTSBURGH — A man rushing to rescue a woman who fell off a McConnell’s Mills State Park waterfall slipped down a hillside and plunged nearly four stories to his own death on the rocks below.
Pennsylvania State Police and park authorities are investigating what appears to be the accidental but heroic death of Donald Spillane, 47, of 567 Callery Road, Cranberry, at 6:50 p.m. Friday.
According to Dan Bickel, manager of the Lawrence County park, Megan McCune, 17, of Slippery Rock had hiked to the lip of the waterfall above the Kildoo Bridge with an unidentified teenage female friend.
Although signs near the gorge warned hikers to avoid the dangerous moss-slick ridge, McCune lost her footing and careened off the slippery waterfall “and landed on rocks and debris down there,” said Bickle.
“Her friend went up the hill to try to get into range to call 911,” Bickel said. “She flagged down two men on motorcycles on the road. One, Joshua Rader, went down the hill to the left. The other, Mr. Spillane, went to the right. At about 35 feet above the gorge, he began to slip. His hand tried to grab onto some hemlock and then he fell, right into the gorge.
“There are a lot of people today who wouldn’t have done what Mr. Spillane did. They would’ve just kept on driving. But he tried to save her,” said Bickel. “Unfortunately, it cost him his life.”
Five local emergency response agencies sped to the bridge. Using rappel ropes, Princeton Volunteer Fire Department rescuers were the first to penetrate the gorge. Emergency medical technicians found Spillane with a weak pulse “and they couldn’t sustain it,” according to Bickel.
McCune remained conscious throughout the ordeal. Rescuers lowered a special basket down the ridge and then flew her to UPMC Presbyterian Hospital for emergency treatment.
“I talked to her father,” said Bickel. “She is going to be OK. She’s being treated for broken bones and puncture wounds in her lower extremities. Those are the sorts of injuries we would expect from a fall from there.”
Bickel said that Rader, Spillane’s son-in-law, didn’t appear to have sustained injuries.
It wasn’t the first time someone has plummeted down the slope. Bickel said another park visitor had deserted the hiking trail for the undesignated area along the tributary to Slippery Rock Creek and toppled over the falls last year. It and other beautiful but dangerous areas of the park are noted in pamphlets, the website and by signs that dot the landscape.
“We tell people always that there’s no hiking trail there. There’s one below there, but not at the top of the waterfall,” said Bickel.
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