2 teens rescued from cliff in San Francisco

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Friday, July 10, 2015
Teen explains how they slipped at SF's Dead Man's cliff
Two teenagers had to be rescued off Dead Man's cliff in Lands End after they slipped trying to retrieve a cellphone.

SAN FRANCISCO -- San Francisco firefighters safely rescued two siblings from a cliff near Lands End in San Francisco Thursday night.

San Francisco fire rescue crews were at Lands End trail where two siblings were stranded on the cliff.

PHOTOS: Crews rescue 2 from cliff at SF's Lands End

SKY7 HD was overhead and captured the teens hanging on to the cliff that was crumbling.

Rescue boats in the water were on the scene to help the hikers off the cliff safely.

Virginia, the 16-year-old sister, and her 15-year-old brother said one of them dropped a cellphone when they were hiking and when they went to retrieve it they became stuck.

"We got stranded out on the cliff because my brother dropped his phone and it looked like we were able to retrieve it but it was misleading," Virginia said. "The cliff was way steeper than we thought. Once were too far out to know we couldn't go any further down we tried to climb back up, but we just couldn't. It was too steep."

The teens used another cellphone they had on them to call 911 and their parents. They waited an hour before they were rescued by firefighters.

Virginia said there were moments when she thought her life was in danger. "When you're crouching on the edge of the cliff, every little slip feels like you could go careening off any second," she said.

She said learned a valuable lesson about not going off the marked trails because it's a lot scarier and steeper than it looks.

The teens were evaluated on the scene and released to their parents.