A woman who fell from a La Jolla cliff onto the rocks below was still alive moments after the fall, witnesses told NBC 7.
San Diego Fire-Rescue launched the rescue of a person found at the base of a cliff off Coast Walk in La Jolla early Monday. [[282863611,C]]
Officials say they got a report of a woman who had fallen 70 feet to the beach below the cliff at the end of the Coast Walk Trail just as it connects with Torrey Pines Road. [[282953711,R]]
At first report, around 5:54 a.m., the woman was said to be not moving.
“If you would’ve seen her face down from up here you would’ve thought she didn’t make it. You would’ve thought the worst,” said Shane Aliyar.
He and his girlfriend were enjoying the view early Monday when a man approached their car. He told the couple that the girl he was with fell off the cliff, Aliyar said. [[282949771,C]]
When Aliyar made it down the cliff he said the woman was unconscious, bleeding from the head and the back.
Local
He told the victim to lay still and instructed Kayla Gans to stay with the woman while he tried to flag down firefighters.
Gans held the victim's head on her lap and repeatedly told her to stay awake. She said the woman complained she was having trouble breathing.
“She was in bad shape,” Aliyar said.
When firefighters and lifeguards approached the woman, she appeared to move her arm.
Firefighters transported the woman, described by officials as 20 years old, to Scripps Hospital.
Ron Graham lives near the trail and said there have been other cliff rescues along that stretch of the coast. [[282935071,C]]
A couple of years ago, he recalled one incident when someone tried to climb up from the base but got stuck in the middle.
“The cliffs are eroding it’s pretty clear. Every year it gets a little less,” Graham said. “You’ve just got to watch it.”
