Tech CEO falls 3,000 feet to his death while climbing California’s Mt. Shasta: reports

An Argentinian tech-CEO fell 3,000 feet to his death last week while descending from the peak of Mount Shasta in northern California, according to officials and reports.

Matias Augusto Travizano, 45, summited the 14,162-foot mountain earlier on Sept. 12 and was joined by two strangers on the “non-technical” and frequently used Clear Creek Trail during his descent, The San Francisco Chronicle reported citing the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office.

The co-founder and former CEO GranData wandered off the easy path and he and one of those strangers ended up stranded on the incredibly steep, icy and rocky Wintun Glacier which is around 13,500 feet in altitude, the report said.

While stranded on the glacier, the pair of climbers attempted a controlled slide down the ice and rock to reach a safer location — but Travizano lost control and struck a boulder about 300 feet below, witnesses told the sheriff.

Travizano appeared to be knocked out for as many as ten minutes by the boulder blow, but was still alive, according to the report. During that time the second climber attempted to reach him, SF Gate reported.

When he regained consciousness and moved — he slipped again and plunged over an edge and out of sight, the sheriff’s office said.

His body was found near the glacier’s base at 10,200 feet by the California Highway Patrol helicopter unit, the Chronicle reported.

“While the Clear Creek Route is considered one of the mountain’s ‘safer’ trails to summit, climbers can become disoriented in low-visibility conditions, particularly when descending from the summit plateau,” the sheriff’s office said, according to the Chronicle.

“Once off the trail, these climbers often wander into more hazardous areas in the Ash Creek or Mud Creek drainages, where accidents are more likely to occur.”

Travizano was a trained physicist and an entrepreneur whose company GranData is a San Francisco based data analytics company, according to reports.

He was named a government adviser in Argentina in 2024 by President Javier Milei, and helped orchestrate the politician’s first tour of Silicon Valley, the Chronicle reported.

Travizano is seen in one group photo alongside both Milei and Apple CEO Tim Cook during that 2024 trip.

He was remembered as “extremely warm, a great family man, and funny as hell,” by one mentee who wrote a heartfelt obituary.