SARANAC LAKE — Talk to anyone who worked with Forest Ranger Robbi Mecus and they’ll likely have an amazing story to share, like how she found a frostbitten, hypothermic hiker this winter who was lost in the middle of a snowstorm, how she helped lead the search last fall for the young girl who was kidnapped in Saratoga County, or how she saved a neighborhood downstate from a wildfire years ago.
“Robbi Mecus had reached a point in her career, after 25 years, where she was in the top tier of a small handful of rangers,” said Rob Praczkajlo, a forest ranger in the Adirondack High Peaks who worked with Mecus for decades.
Mecus died in a climbing accident in Alaska on Thursday, April 25. She was 52 years old. Many who worked with her said Mecus was in the best shape of her life. She leaves a legacy that includes some of the most heroic search and rescue missions in recent decades.
Praczkajlo remembers a rescue in 2015 that Mecus played a key role in. An injured hiker was at the Boquet Lean-To in the Dix Range. The sun was setting and they were running out of time to hoist the person out of the woods by helicopter. That’s when Mecus tied a harness on the hiker in record time.
“Had Robbi not been able to tie that hasty harness on the victim in about 90 seconds we literally wouldn’t have been able to do the hoist and it would have been an all-night carry-out,” said Praczkajlo, who described Mecus as a rockstar, one of the very best in wilderness search and rescue.
Mecus’s journey to the woman she became in her 40s and 50s was long and difficult. She was born in Brooklyn in 1971 in a boy’s body and lived most of her life in that body. Praczkajlo said Mecus struggled for years with her identity.
“It was torture to watch her be tortured by it,” said Praczkajlo, fighting back tears. “I give her so much credit for having the strength to do what she felt she needed to do.”
In an interview with NCPR in 2020, Mecus said she knew she was trans from a young age, but didn’t have any queer role models setting an example for who she could become. Mecus also worried she wouldn’t be able to do the things she loved if she transitioned.
“There are many reasons I didn’t come out until I was 44, but one of them was because I didn’t see anybody else doing the things that I still wanted to do and I didn’t think I could do them,” said Mecus. “I didn’t see any queer rangers. I didn’t see any trans climbers.”
Mecus had to blaze that trail herself. She had to come out to her family, including her young daughter, as well as forest rangers, police and fire chiefs, volunteer search and rescuers like Ron Konowitz.
“I really didn’t understand it, to be honest, like I didn’t understand why someone would want to go and transition like that,” said Konowitz.
But despite not initially understanding her decision, Konowitz said it was easy to get behind Mecus and support her. She was so good at her job, such a skilled climber, and so patient with people, always willing to talk to folks that didn’t see eye to eye with her. Konowitz said Mecus accomplished so much.
“The fact that she was able to open up so many people’s minds to the idea of a trans woman being a ranger and being in law enforcement in the Adirondacks, which is pretty conservative, she gained so much respect,” said Konowitz.
Safety in the woods was at the forefront of what Mecus did. In the winter, Mecus would often patrol Cascade Mt., the busiest High Peak, and enforce snowshoe requirements. She’d also monitor hiking groups on social media, where people ask about trail conditions and what gear they might need. In the comment section, Mecus would respectfully explain the rules of the Adirondack backcountry.
She was also a key link between the rangers and the climbing community. Climbers have a long history of helping forest rangers with more technical rescues. When Mecus came to the High Peaks, Konowitz said she upped the ante on the cohort of volunteer climbers.
“She came in and wanted to bring all the volunteers back in again to train, but before you could do that, you had to climb with Robbi,” Konowitz explained.
Mecus was also a mentor to climbers in the queer community. She helped organize the annual Adirondack Queer Ice Fest and advocated on a broader level for LGBTQ rights. She helped organize Pride Fest in her hometown of Keene Valley.
“For the queer community, for the trans community– she’s a superhero,” said Paige Humphrey, who described Mecus as a mentor.
Humphrey met Mecus through climbing. Along with the Queer Ice Fest, Mecus would also organize smaller groups of queer climbers throughout the year. Humphrey said Mecus would set the route and make sure everyone was safe.
“We got to climb full rock and it was set up like a top rope,” said Humphrey. “Robbi got it all done for us. We were climbing. Same with the ice climbing. She made us feel like we can do anything because we can. Queer people can do anything.”
Mecus was also an example of how queer people can be anything. They can be wildland firefighters, forest rangers, rock and ice climbers, and beautiful, feminine people. Her good friend and fellow forest ranger Allison Rooney said that balance was important to Mecus’s identity as a trans woman.
“She was the person that wanted to be down in the dirt getting muddy and fighting the fire with ash smeared across her face,” said Rooney, “but then she also wanted to go home and put on a cute dress and some heels and go dancing.”
Mecus was so authentically herself. Rooney became a forest ranger because of Mecus and the example she set in what’s long been a male-dominated field. Rooney remembers talking to Mecus before she decided to become a ranger a few years ago.
“We would sit and have these late-night conversations about life and just what her job was like and how that would fit into my life,” said Rooney.
Rooney said Mecus passed on so many skills and lessons to her and other younger forest rangers.
Mecus died less than a decade after she transitioned. But she used that time to the fullest, turning the biggest struggle of her life into something other people can strive for. Rooney said setting that positive example for other queer people and other outdoorswomen was a driving force in Mecus’s life.
“She realized the role models she was looking for in the climbing community and beyond didn’t exist for her and she wanted to be that beacon for other people who were struggling in the same way,” said Rooney.
Rooney believes Mecus wouldn’t want people to grieve her too much in death. Instead, she’d want everyone get out into the woods, go for a climb, have a drink around a campfire— all the things Mecus really loved to do.