Cat at Northeast's highest peak dies after 12 years on duty

Marty, a black Maine coon cat, succumbed to “an unforeseen illness," Mount Washington Summit Operations Manager Rebecca Scholand said in a news release Monday. “As a past observer who lived on the summit for four years, I can tell you Marty was a special companion, entertainer and so incredibly loved by observers and state park staff and will be sadly missed,” she wrote. The Mount Washington Observatory staff have had a cat at the 6,288-foot (1,915-meter) summit, called the “home of the world's worst weather," since 1932.