SAN FRANCISCO – She was an "adrenaline junkie" who was describing herself. He took "worthy photos of a wow" of the couple posing at the edge of a cliff and jumping aircraft that appeared on social media and on a travel blog that drew thousands d & # 39; subscribers. .

In a message to the Grand Canyon this spring, Meenakshi Moorthy, 30, even warned the daredevils trying to take selfies to dangerous heights: "Did you know that gusts of wind can be FATALES ??? " The legend accompanies a photo of Moorthy sitting on the edge of the north bank of the canyon.

The couple's last trip has turned out to be their last. Moorthy and her husband, Vishnu Viswanath, 29, Indian expatriates living in California, died in Yosemite National Park last week while they were taking a selfie, the man's brother said Tuesday.

They set up their tripod near a ledge in a park overlooking California, said Viswanath's brother, Jishnu Viswanath, to the Associated Press. The visitors saw the camera the next morning and alerted the park guards, who "used very powerful binoculars to find them and helicopters to transport the bodies by plane," he said.

Rangers have found their bodies about 800 feet (245 meters) below Taft Point, where visitors can head to the edge of a granite cornice producing vertigo that offers spectacular views of the valley of Yosemite.

Their publications on social networks, in search of thrills, prefigure the relationship of the couple with the growing problem of deaths by selfie.

A study published this month in the Journal of Family Medicine and Primary Care found that 259 people died taking selfies between October 2011 and November 2017.

The report, based on the findings of researchers in India who have traveled the international media, said the main causes of self-reported deaths were drowning, usually involving people washed away by waves or the falling of a boat, followed by people killed while standing in front of a moving train, deaths due to falls from heights or taking pictures with dangerous animals.

More than 10 people have died in Yosemite this year, some from natural causes and others from falls, Park spokesman Scott Gediman said.

Moorthy and Viswanath were born in India and lived for a few years in the United States, most recently in the San Francisco Bay Area. Cisco India said Viswanath was a software engineer based at the company's headquarters in San Jose, California, in Silicon Valley.

They graduated in 2010 from the Faculty of Engineering Chengannur, in Alapuzha district, in the state of Kerala, India, told APA. one of their teachers, Nisha Kuruvilla. She said that Moorthy and Viswanath were both good students who loved to travel and who were married in a Hindu temple in Kerala, southern India, four years ago.

Moorthy described it with her husband as "obsessed with the trip" on their blog, "Holidays & Happily Ever Afters", which was canceled Tuesday. It was filled with photos of the couple in front of snowy peaks and during romantic trips across Europe, where they took selfies in a gondola in Venice, at the leaning tower of Pisa and at the Vatican.

Moorthy wanted to work full time as a tourism blogger, said her brother-in-law. She described herself as an "eccentric free spirit" and as "an adrenaline enthusiast with roller coaster and parachuting does not scare me," said Viswanath.

She posed at the edge of the Grand Canyon, dressed in a Wonder Woman costume, and wrote: "We are many, including yours, to admire the brazen attempts to stand at the edge of cliffs and scrapers. But did you know that the gust of wind can be FATAL ??? Is our life worth a photo? "

The Facebook cover photo of her husband shows the smiling couple, arms around their body, in a precipice of the Grand Canyon. "Live life to the end," he wrote.

In a July 2017 message, the couple celebrated their wedding anniversary by skydiving in Santa Barbara, California. Moorthy posted a video on Instagram that shows her wearing a t-shirt with the title "Gimme Danger" and showing a thumbs up while she jumps off the plane.

"I think I can fly, I think I can touch the sky," she wrote in her message. "Aaaand touched the sky that I had just erased at 18,000 feet thanks to the unconditional love-ninja of my life, Vishnu, who literally took the surprise of the birthday this year a notch "higher" than the hot air balloon adventure of last year, offering this adrenaline junkie with one of the highest tandem parachute jumps at world! "

She has also published a blog about depression. In an article published in April, Moorthy apologized to readers for their silence and "disappearance for more than a year".

"Between the fight against the shrinking tentacles of depression and the escapades in the storm of madness on the move, I'm afraid social media will take the back seat?" she wrote.

The photos of the couple indicated that they liked to pose in picturesque places at sunset, the last time they were seen alive.

In a strange coincidence, another couple who walked up to Taft Point captured photos of Moorthy before she fell, claiming that she appears in the background of two of their selfies.

Sean Matteson said Moorthy stood out from the crowd watching the sunset on the gazebo because his hair was dyed bright pink. He said that she had made him a little nervous because she was close to the edge.

"She was very close to the edge, but it seemed like she was having a good time," said Matteson of Oakland, California. "She gave me the willies, there is no guardrail, I was not about to approach so close to the edge." But she seemed to be She did not seem to be in distress or anything. "

The travel advice website, MyYosemitePark.com, has published a photo of Taft Point to illustrate his list of "bad selfies," warning tourists: "Do not pose at the top of a huge granite deposit." He added: "It would be enough for a loose rock or a bad foot to collapse."

Yosemite spokeswoman Jamie Richards said officials were investigating the deaths, which could take several days.

In India, after a series of deaths related to selfies, the Ministry of Tourism asked the government authorities in April to protect tourists by installing signs in areas where accidents were declared as "areas without selfies ".