A 65-year-old woman died Tuesday afternoon when she fell about 15-feet onto a rock ledge near her summer cottage on McFarland Shore Road in Bristol.
Sheriff’s Lt. Mike Murphy said the woman, Margaret Conlon, 65, from New Jersey, had been on the shore with her two granddaughters and her daughter, sitting on a rock ledge at the edge of the water.
Slightly after 4 p.m., they decided to return to their cabin; and walking up a steep, narrow rock ledge, which they had used, Conlon was the last to climb, following her granddaughters.
Conlon lost her footing, grabbed some shrubbery and was unable to stop and fell 15-feet onto a rock, hitting the back of her head.
“It was a tragic accident,” Lt. Murphy said.
Bristol firefighters were called to the location around 5 p.m. on a report that a woman had fallen and needed help.
Shortly after they arrived and discovered the severe head injury, firefighters asked dispatchers to send sheriff’s deputies to the scene.
When called, Bristol Fire Chief Ron Pendleton had declined to identify the woman, explaining her daughter did not want the incident to be publicized.