Teams looking for three climbers who have been missing for more than a week on Oregon's Mount Hood found a body Sunday after searching a second snow cave.

The body has not yet been identified, but authorities believe it to be one of the three missing climbers.

A Chinook helicopter extracts the rescue team from the summit of Mount Hood after they found one of the missing climbers dead inside a snow cave on Sunday.
(Kevork Djansezian/Associated Press)

The discovery comes as rescue crews on Sunday earlier found a sleeping bag, ice axes and rope inside another snow cave near the peak of Mount Hood.

Rescuers believed that cave was once used by the men and that the climbers could have moved to another snow cave, said Sgt. Gerry Tiffany, spokesman for the Hood River County Sheriff's Office in Oregon.

"They hunkered down in the snow and they survived there for a while, helping themselves, hiking out of there, climbing out of there," Tiffany said earlier.

Authorities said the first cave was discovered in the area where one of the climbers made a distress call a week ago. A Chinook helicopter had lowered a team of rescuers onto a ridge above the site.

Near the first cave, helicopters had spotted rope that had been intentionally laid out in a Y-shape.

Climbers often do that to indicate their location. There was also an ice spike and footprints, Tiffany said.

The spot was about 3,350 metres up and on the north side of the 3,426-metre mountain, said Marc Smith, a deputy with the Hood River County Sheriff's Office.

On Saturday, they reached 3,239 metres before nightfall and worsening weather forced them off the mountain. With the weather colder but clearer Sunday, they set out again from 1,829 metres, following a path they made in the snow Saturday, officials said.

No communication

There has been no communication from Kelly James, 48, of Dallas, 37-year-old Brian Hall of Dallas, or 36-year-old Jerry "Nikko" Cooke of New York City since Dec. 10, when James used his cellphone to call his family.

He told them he was sheltering in a snow cave while his companions started back down the mountain, apparently to get help for him.

The last clue to their whereabouts was a brief signal returned from James's cellphone Tuesday.

Tiffany said crews were prepared to search throughout the evening on the mountain, Tiffany said.

"We're by no means ready to give up yet," he said.

With files from the Associated Press