1st Hand Account of Women Stuck on Longs

[Gareth]

I don't want to criticize, but this story in part shows me why I'm still not all the worried about buying a GPS. I feel safer navigating on a climbing route by looking at what is around me. Sure, I've taken a detour or two that probably could have been avoided if I had had a GPS. This happened a few weeks ago. However, with a route description and a topo map, I figured out an easy way to find my way back onto the route. I was glad that I had some navigational know-how. I'm just afraid that some people may get themselves into trouble by relying too much on technology that may or may not be all that reliable at any given point in time.

(Of course, all bets are off if you are trying to follow a faulty route description.)

[djkest]

They were prepared in a number of ways, and once the storm hit it sounds like they made good decisions and fought hard to survive. The hike out must have been very difficult.

However; If on MONDAY the weather got worse and TUESDAY it was still bad, it was risky for them to go ahead and climb high on Longs Peak. I know hindsight is 20/20 and so they didn't know what was coming.

According to them:

Monday: Weather turns worse, continue hiking
Tuesday: Weather sucks, continue hiking on a committed route
Wednesday morning: Weather sucks, lets go summit a class 3 14er with routefinding challenges

I have climbed a few times in less than ideal weather, I'll be the first to admit it. Glad to see they survived the ordeal and are probably better for it.

Edit: checked what I posted in the locked thread. I said we should avoid speculation. :p

[anthony156]

I think this is an incredible story of them surviving and taking their opportunity to get out safely. However I second

Monday: Weather turns worse, continue hiking
Tuesday: Weather sucks, continue hiking on a committed route
Wednesday morning: Weather sucks, lets go summit a class 3 14er with routefinding challenges.
.

I know it's pointless getting into speculation, but if the weather's bad early in the morning, that's generally a good time to fold the cards and get off the mountain, especially something slick like Longs. To me it sounds like summit fever in a really precarious spot.

[HikerGuy]

To me it sounds like summit fever in a really precarious spot.

To me it sounds like they were wet, cold and wanted to get back to their car which was parked at Bear Lake on the other side of Longs Peak.

[SchralpTheGnar]

Incredible story of survival and perseverance, what humans are able to do when pushed to the limits never ceases to amaze me. That bushwhack down wild basin is no joke in and of itself.

[anthony156]

I agree it's an insane example of human survival, however

To me it sounds like summit fever in a really precarious spot.

To me it sounds like they were wet, cold and wanted to get back to their car which was parked at Bear Lake on the other side of Longs Peak.

"At daybreak, visibility was very poor with driving rain. When visibility improved
slightly, we still had time to cover the short but difficult distance to our intended
campsite. We hiked cross country as planned, since there is no trail in this area, and then
started climbing the gully described in the route description, reaching the top about an
hour and a half later."


Why keep climbing and not get off the mountain?

[djkest]

If this is the route they were on, looks pretty awesome.

[youtubevideo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dn97q8SfJMQ[/youtubevideo]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dn97q8SfJMQ" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Aside from some bushwacking.

[rickinco123]

This mountain is covered by hikers/climbers from "expert" experience level all the way down to "never hiked any mountain before." These 2 were the only ones who got stuck up there. I don't think they were extremely reckless and are obviously capable, but mistakes were made.

What is it with these women and their families name dropping politicians? This happened twice on the tumblr post ( along with a promo/bio video for Nemo ) and then again by them in their report. Why do the pols get name drops and not the rescuers? Is it appropriate for them to be haranguing our local politicians during a major crisis?

I find this whole thing weird to say the least.

[crossfitter]

Why keep climbing and not get off the mountain?

Because they were 10+ miles and many thousand vertical feet away from their car with the easiest descent route on the other side of the mountain?

All people were doing was similar to the scientific method.

The single most important aspect of the scientific method, and the only one that really matters, is to gather data and refine your hypothesis until it matches your observations. This is in stark contrast to the method 'round these parts of inventing bulls**t and immediately drawing conclusions.

Well, in complete fairness here, you were also assuming that they had started their hike around that time, just like the rest of us (you said Tuesday night).

I stated that, from direct deduction of the initial 1st hand facts, they had set up camp on Tuesday night - correctly implying that they started their trip sometime before the storm. This was in response to multiple accounts of defective reading comprehension assuming that they started from the trailhead sometime on Wednesday.

I find it curious that the "Don't Criticize" people say "You can criticize, but not on memorial threads". Then, when that is obliged, they say "Well, it's still wrong until the facts are out". OK, now the facts are out. And of course, people are STILL shouting down those who dare to criticize.

The "don't criticize" viewpoint essentially boils down to the following points:

* Don't attempt to fill in missing details with wild-ass guesses
* Don't rip on people for actions invented in said wild-ass guesses
* Wait until the body is cold before picking the accident apart publicly

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Now that we've got that out of the way and the facts are out, here's my take:

They did all the right things to prepare for their trip given historical seasonal trends and the forecast at the time. Suggesting they should have been carrying crampons and other full-on winter gear for a 43 mile loop hike in early September is beyond laughable.

Having been on the trail for nearly a week, there is no way they could have known that the storm of the century was brewing. Waiting for visibility to clear and push through the final technical obstacle standing between you and your car is a completely understandable decision and many would have done nothing different given the information at the time. I know I probably would have done the same thing. When things got really bad, they made the exact right call and opted to bivy.

I've personally been through the Loft three times and have never found the infamous Clark's arrow even in good conditions. A standard topo will not help you identify the downclimb. A hand-drawn map is much more detailed and useful for finding such small features. Besides, what good are a map and compass in 30' visibility anyway?

Everyone who claims to want to learn from accidents, pay attention. Trying to distill this incident down to a simple one liner of "don't climb in bad weather hurr durr" is the exact wrong takeaway. If you do this long enough, you will eventually find yourself having to choose to take a calculated risk. If you intend to get out there and always make the 100% safest textbook decision, you will never summit anything. The important lesson here is that you may eventually get burned on a calculated risk and be forced to deal with the consequences. Rather than panicking and getting themselves hurt, these women handled a bad situation like experienced backcountry travelers.

[Derby Ale]

Everything stated in above post

[BHallDDS]

I agree it's an insane example of human survival, however

To me it sounds like summit fever in a really precarious spot.

To me it sounds like they were wet, cold and wanted to get back to their car which was parked at Bear Lake on the other side of Longs Peak.

"At daybreak, visibility was very poor with driving rain. When visibility improved
slightly, we still had time to cover the short but difficult distance to our intended
campsite. We hiked cross country as planned, since there is no trail in this area, and then
started climbing the gully described in the route description, reaching the top about an
hour and a half later."


Why keep climbing and not get off the mountain?

Yeah, what still gets me is the decision to ascend into Keplinger's with the weather the way it was. That is definitely a committed route for sure once you're up there. While people bitch about speculation, what ifs, and what not, I've learned alot on these forums about decision making. Hearing stories like this and then commentary following about them has perhaps saved my life when going up/summitting wasn't the best decision and I chose not to. Feeling immortal out there gets us into some difficult situations and I'm still rather shocked they didn't have a plan B or plan C route to get them back to their car (Bear Lake) from the bottom of Keplingers. Yeah, it would've still been a pain in the butt but a lot better option then what they were facing. If you were truly "experienced in the backcountry" you'd at least talk about bail outs that right?

[Hungry Jack]

Everyone who claims to want to learn from accidents, pay attention. Trying to distill this incident down to a simple one liner of "don't climb in bad weather hurr durr" is the exact wrong takeaway. If you do this long enough, you will eventually find yourself having to choose to take a calculated risk. If you intend to get out there and always make the 100% safest textbook decision, you will never summit anything. The important lesson here is that you may eventually get burned on a calculated risk and be forced to deal with the consequences. Rather than panicking and getting themselves hurt, these women handled a bad situation like experienced backcountry travelers.

+1. There are far too many variables to pin it on a single decision. My impression in looking at situations like this is that there is a chain of events, like forks in the road, that you can identify where a different decision might have been made to mitigate or avoid risk, but for me it is much more a risk modeling exercise than a trial by jury.

I think the operative statement from above is "calculated risk". This is where planning is vital. By all accounts, they managed this quite well.

There was a horrific and heartbreaking story from my native Missouri in January where a father and two sons died of exposure during a long (20 mile) dayhike on the Ozark Trail when a front came through (going from 60 and sun to 30s and windy rain in about 4 hours). They had inappropriate clothing (cotton or light fleece, no foul-weather gear) and no map (they missed the spur around dusk on their return that had them .5 miles from their rented cabin). These risks could and should have been avoided with proper planning, as I think the risks should have been anticipated and mitigated with proper planning (knowledge of weather forecast, trail map with mileages) before starting the hike that day. I think the tragedy was largely avoidable. The situation on Longs was not so easy to foresee, and their decisions during it were quite reasonable.