Manchester Firefighter Has 'Small World' Moment On Kilimanjaro

MANCHESTER, CT — Manchester firefighter and EMT Rob Rising said that a moment nearly as amazing as climbing Mt. Kilmanjaro itself was the timing of an encounter on the summit.

It was Feb. 28 when he posted a picture of himself on Facebook. He had reached the summit a few days earlier with a group of hikers from the state.

To his left though, was another group — representing the Connecticut Special Olympics law Enforcement Torch run.

"While I have a moment (and also a little wi-fi) I wanted to share the amazing timing of our summit," he said in the post. "We ended up meeting up on the summit with the group of police officers from Connecticut who were trekking for the Special Olympics."

Rising said it was two separate groups from Connecticut starting two days apart on different routes on the mountain ending up at the summit during each group's 15-to-20-minute summit window.

"I still can't grasp how that happened," he said. "It was so crazy that we ended up summiting at the same time as the officers for the torch run ... Can't make it up ... such a small world."

Rising made the trek in mid-February.

Mount Kilimanjaro is the highest mountain in Africa with its summit at 19,341 feet. According to the online Kilimanjaro Trek Guide, Kilimanjaro is situated in the Northern part of Tanzania, in Kilimanjaro National Park. The mountain is a dormant volcano made up of three volcanic cones and the summit is called Uhuru peak. A summit hike could take four-to-five days to complete along the fastest route. Because of a "rapid ascent" the hike can be challenging because of altitude sickness risks.

Rising took the Lemosho Route via the southern slopes of one of the cones — Kibo — up to Stella Point and then west around the crater rim to Uhuru Peak.

Rising is also a skier. He and a woman in his group were joking about taking on some of the snow-covered bowls on Uhuru.

"Heather and I were talking about skiing at the top as well. Oxygen would definitely be a problem," he said with a laugh.