VANCOUVER, Wash. -- A high school music teacher in Vancouver died Wednesday night after falling from a horse, deputies said.

Clark County deputies said a fellow equestrian rider found 57-year-old Candy Morrison dead on a gravel road.

Deputies were first alerted of the incident after the horse returned to its boarding stable on Rawson Road in Hockinson without its rider. The fellow rider went looking for Morrison up a road owned by Longview Timber.

About 1 mile up the road, she discovered Morrison's body. Morrison suffered head trauma in the fall and was not wearing a riding helmet, according to the sheriff's office. Investigators said she was likely bucked off the horse.

Morrison was a teacher at Hudson's Bay High School. Prior to that, she taught music at West Linn High School for 25 years.

One of her students, Amreal Presler, said Morrison suffered broken ribs a few months ago after she was bucked off a horse. Presler said Morrison's death will be difficult for students.

"I loved her so much. She was there for me whenever I had a hard time and she talked to me about my problems," Presler said. "She loved all her students. She cries every time that we have to graduate."

Counselors were available Thursday to Hudson's Bay students and staff.

An autopsy on Morrison's body is pending.

The high school's choir will perform a tribute concert for Morrison at 7 p.m. Monday in the school commons.

Morrison is the second Hudson's Bay High School teacher to die in the 2009-10 school year. Gordon Patterson was killed by a hit-and-run driver last September while he was riding his bicycle home from school.

Antonio Cellestine, the man who hit Patterson, later pleaded guilty to vehicular homicide and hit-and-run.

Teacher Dies After Falling From Horse