A young Signal Mountain woman died from a fall from a steep bluff late Friday afternoon.

At approximately 5:30 p.m., the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office and Hamilton County Emergency Services were called to 6599 Forest Park Drive at the Falling Water State Natural Area on a person down.

When emergency personnel arrived on the scene, they were advised that two girls were walking on the trail when Marie Graham Carpenter, 19, decided to look over the edge. When she bent over to look, her glasses fell and, while attempting to grab them, she lost her balance and fell 80-100 feet to the bottom.



When emergency personnel reached Ms. Carpenter, they found she died from the injuries she sustained in the fall.

The Criminal Investigative Division was notified to respond and will do the follow-up investigation.

Ms. Carpenter was a graduate of Chattanooga Christian School.

Her parents, Neel and Lane Carpenter, had been Bible translators in Papaua New Guinea for many years and she grew up there.

Her sister, Sarah Carpenter, said the family had received word around 3:30 p.m. that her niece, eight-week-old Gwenyth Carpenter, of Harrisonburg, Va., had died of heart complications while en route to the University of Virginia Hospital.

She said Marie had gone to Falling Water up on Signal Mountain with a friend to have a moment to grieve the loss of her niece.

She noted that their mother, Lane Carpenter, found out within three hours that she had lost both a granddaughter and a daughter.

Marie was the sixth of eight children.

She would have turned 20 years old on June 11.

She worked at Starbucks on Brainerd Road and attended New City Fellowship church.

Funeral arrangements will be announced by Lane Funeral Home, 601 Ashland Terrace.