Army veteran died on stroke of 11 on Armistice Day after falling from Snowdon cliff

A British Army veteran died on the stroke of 11am on Armistice Day when he fell 160 ft from a ridge on Mount Snowdon, an inquest heard.

William Onion, 33, lost his footing while trying to retrieve a drone at the same time as the two minutes’ silence was being observed.

Onion, a personal trainer who had served for seven years in the Royal Signals with tours in Afghanistan and the Falkland Islands, sustained multiple fatal injuries when he fell on Nov 11 last year.

He had been attempting the Crib Goch trail on the mountain now known as Yr Wyddfa.

Crib Goch, which translates into English as Red Ridge, is an exposed ridgeway near the mountain’s summit with sheer drops on either side.

A group of five friends who had accompanied him on the hike raised the alarm at 11am after losing sight of him falling down the slope.

Emergency services discovered him soon after and he was pronounced dead at the scene.

‘No man could be prouder’

Kate Robertson, the senior coroner for north west Wales, ruled his death as accidental.

Alastair Onion, his father, said in tribute: “He passed at 11am on the eleventh day of the eleventh month, a soldier through and through, a son that no man could have been prouder of.

“I have no words to convey how devastated we are. William fell from Snowdon mountain. He was doing what he loved, he was with friends, that much we are thankful for.

“He was happy, loved and someone that whomever met him, thought the world of him.

“William, we will always miss you.”

Sarah Edwards, one of the walkers accompanying Onion, told the inquest he was “an experienced hiker and extremely surefooted”.

Ms Edwards said she had watched him chase after the drone after it fell down the side of an extremely steep slope on the mountain

A post mortem examination carried out by Dr Brian Rodgers, a Home Office pathologist, found he had suffered multiple fatal injuries.

Dr Rogers, ruling his death as accidental, said in tribute: “He was doing something that he loved in an area that he loved.”