'Watch out!' -- and the stones rained down

Paul Cunha was hiking on a barren and rocky trail 17,000 feet up, gazing up at the serene summit of Mount Kilimanjaro 2,340 feet ahead, when a deadly cascade of boulders showered down on top of him.

Cunha was hit in the shoulder and knocked unconscious. As a boulder bounded her way, his wife, Carol, dived to the side. Pelted in the head by a smaller rock, she survived. But three other hikers were not as lucky.

Betty Sapp, 63, of Melrose, and Mary Lou Sammis, 57, of New York, who were with the Cunhas in a group of 13 hikers from the Appalachian Mountain Club, died in the rockslide in Tanzania Wednesday. Also killed was Kristian Ferguson, 27, of Colorado, who had been hiking with a group from his state.

Yesterday, the Cunhas described how a frigid, clear morning of mountaineering became a hellish deluge of stone -- with nowhere to hide and only seconds to react. Paul Cunha, with his arm swollen and bandaged, spoke from a hospital bed on the sixth floor of Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. Carol Cunha sat by his side.

''It was an absolutely wonderful experience, up until the tragic events of that day," said Paul Cunha, 45, a director of facilities for the Appalachian Mountain Club, who was hoping to return soon to the couple's home in Jefferson, N.H.

The morning of the accident was cold, about 25 degrees, he said. After coffee and porridge, the Cunhas headed out with some 150 hikers -- 30 international tourists and 120 Tanzanian porters -- climbing in a long line toward the summit. It was the sixth day of what was supposed to be an eight-day hike.

Three hours into their climb, a cracking noise erupted near the top of the mountain. Porters, unsure what had caused the disruption, quieted the hikers. The Cunhas looked up to see hikers 1,000 feet ahead -- no bigger than thimbles in the distance -- lurching for safety and screaming.

''Watch out!" someone in the distance yelled, Paul Cunha recalled. ''Run!"

Boulders and tiny stones poured like gray rain down the austere face of the mountain.

The Cunhas were trapped.

The rocks tumbled into a bowl-shaped depression several hundred feet in front of the Cunhas and then fired out, bouncing in great leaps of about 200 feet, Paul Cunha said.

''I have this vivid memory of them literally flying out of that depression like a cannonball," he said. ''And it was a blink or two of the eye from when they flew out and basically came down the slope at us."

He saw one headed his way but it was too late.

''The image I have just before I got hit is of this one rock -- the size of a trash can -- and it was flying through the air," he said.

Carol Cunha, 44, five feet in front of her husband, saw the same mountain menace.

''I dove off to the side, and obviously it missed," she said.

Despite its altitude, Kilimanjaro is considered a relatively safe hike, rangers say. An estimated 20,000 people attempt it each year, mostly without incident, according to park officials. About 10 people die annually in the attempt, they said.

After the calamity, James Wakibara, acting chief warden of Kilimanjaro National Park, said that an earth tremor or a rapid change of weather, accompanied by high winds, might have caused the rockslide.

''This is a highly unusual if not unprecedented occurrence," said William Hill, president of the AMC board of directors, who visited Paul Cunha at the hospital yesterday. ''People who die on this mountain usually die from the effects of the oxygen and the altitude."

The Cunhas said they did not see Betty Sapp or the other victims during the rockslide. Wade Sapp, 66, Betty's husband, who was also on the hike, survived.

After the stones passed, porters bandaged Paul Cunha's shoulder and led him down the five-hour hike to the base of the mountain. On the way, they passed stretchers, one apparently carrying a body swathed in blankets. After flying by helicopter and plane, Paul Cunha arrived in Boston Friday.

Neighbors of the Sapps said they had prepared for their African trek with other hikes in Switzerland and the Grand Canyon. Paul Cunha said he had hiked with them in Ireland several years ago. Hill said he also knew them.

''There seemed to be a real connectedness to them and they were really doing what they loved," he said yesterday.

Hill joked that he wants to see Cunha swinging a hammer again soon, and Cunha said he has his own plans for the future -- not least among them to return to Kilimanjaro and this time reach the summit.

''Once I get better I'd go back in a heartbeat," he said. ''It's a beautiful place."