Three Hikers Lost for 3 days

Don't know if you noticed this last week. The interesting part of this Survival Situation is that they actually hiked into the wrong water shed and were actually heading south-west instead of south-east and being drawn down a much larger valley deeper into B.C. "The women thought they were hiking back toward Upper Kananaskis Lake - but they had become turned around and were headed in the opposite direction, into B.C.".

Article Link

I think this survival situation points out five good lessons:

1) You need to carry a Map and Compass and understand how to use them.
2) A GPS is an excellent tool to tell you where you are.
3) A SARSAT or SPOT beacon could have reduced this search and rescue to a simple rescue operation.
4) In the wilderness a moving target is always harder to find.
5) Water is an essential element of survival. They became dehydrated because they could not purify water even with a good source beside them. This ability is essential to survival.

So they were actually gone six days. I wonder how much of it they were lost?

> "...weren't able to retrace their steps, despite having a map and compass."

As soon as you know you're lost and don't know what direction to take, PARK IT!

If they had planned for three days, what were they doing for water? Did they carry enough for three people for three days? That's a lot of water. They didn't have a container or firemaking equipment to boil water??? That should have worked fine for organic nasties, and chemical ones wouldn't have been an issue unless they were in mining country.

That's the trouble with those compass and map-things... you have to know how to use them, and actually pull them out and look at them occasionally. A glance at the compass should have told them they were going in the wrong direction.

The Canadian military doesn't get involved in searches like these for practice?

Sue

Good question Sue about the water.

I couldn't pull up the article (stupid satellite internet)

Agree on navigation being key. I mean, SW versus SE is kinda/sorta easy to mix up, but that whole "Gee the sun is sitting in front of us" should help. And those compasses are pretty easy to use.

If they were getting dehydrated, and sitting on water, then they're frigging idiots. Drink, deal with the runs if you get them by drinking some more. After a couple days your body will most likely settle down. IF you even get the runs. I think a professor from UC Davis or Berkley did a bunch of studies in the Sierra Nevadas. Big take home point I remember was water is pretty clean in the top couple inches b/c of UV light from the sun.

This was on the local news and also a some other news websites. I did not see any mention that the people were dehydrated from not being able to filter water.

The Kananaskis area and Peter Lougheed Provincial Park covers a vast area and although there are plenty of streams,creeks, accessing the water is not always easy due to terrain etc. For those not familiar with the area, this is very rugged, mountainous country.

Nonetheless, the mention of the importance of carrying a SPOT or PLB is very important and every back country user should carry one.

Their problem would appear to be a lack of very basic, fundamental outdoor skills, particularly map and compass (obviously). I am not familiar with that area, but I can,t imagine that there wasn't abundant water in that kind of high alpine environment. The chances are very high that the water if perfectly fine to drink without treatment of any kind. If one felt treatment to be necessary, boiling is an easy, obvious procedure that works far better than other techniques. Since they were on a planned three day hike, they surely must have had some kind of container that would have worked for boiling. Perhaps they were out of stove fuel, or didn't know how to kindle a wood fire, but one suspects that they were very sketchy on basic back country skills.

Electronic gadgetry could have saved the day, but so could the employment of very simple, straightforward procedures.

If you can't read a map and locate yourself on it, never stray from the visitor center and ranger led hikes.

I agree on the fundamental lack of skills.

As for the water situation, yes this is mountainous alpine country and although I have not hiked in the immediate area, I have hiked and spent many days in the vicinity. Water can either be abundant or nonexistent for miles. Once while out on a hiking trail and about the same time of year, we went all day and only found readily accessible water source near the trail even though there were creeks near that you would need climbing gear to reach...

Back to the original story. If you get lost, stay put and at least move to a nearby clearing so that SAR has a better chance of spotting you.

Could the hikers navigational errors added up by not taking into account the 15 1/2 East Magnetic declination. That is quite a considerable declination and not taking this into account after say 4 waypoints might have eventually had them heading 90 degrees off course into the wrong water shed valley.



Unfortunately a GPS isn't a very good tool to tell folks which direction to head off to. i.e. the wrong map datum and incorrect Mag declination information may have made matters worse because the hikers will trust the electronic box to point them in the correct (wrong) direction.



The nice cup of strong sweet tea procedure should have sorted them out so that it forced a StopThinkObservePlan.

They must have had the ability to make a cup of tea, if going for a planned 3 day hike. Shudders to think otherwise.

1) Not accounting for declination in this area would have drawn them east not west. They went in the opposite direction at one point and them dropped down into the wrong side of the continental divide. The valley they found and the watershed they were then following was taking them south-west not east or south-east like they wanted to go.

2) "They were tired and dehydrated, but otherwise OK, Webb said." They may have been relying on a stove to boil water for them and simply run out of fuel. I was hiking for a week just south of there two weeks ago. Every stream and river were still running higher than normal, so there should have been plenty of water. There rescuers said they were dehydrated so some part of their water purification system was not working.

Yes if heading in a northerly direction, but would have drawn them west if heading in a southerly direction. It definitely suggests they were doing something wrong navigationally using a map and compass. Small errors over time add up to create big errors unless they are compensated for.

After looking at the Mag declination in the area, moving approx 50 miles west of Calgary the Mag declination itself moves a quite considerable 0.5 degrees. The nearer you get to the magnetic north pole the tricker it gets when using a compass for accurate navigation.

http://www.magnetic-declination.com/

The area looks like a wonderful area to get lost though.

From what I can gather, I think the hike they were on is well known, but can be hard to navigate and requires are certain amount of route finding ability.

This has brought up something I've been wondering about. Which is the more critical piece of kit: the GPS or the PLB?

I am thinking about my situation particularly, I'd have the appropriate map & compass and some basic skills, but not a whole lot of experience with them. Granted, in the near term I'd be sticking to fairly well known areas, but arguably these women were as well.

So, given that, what would be the priority in acquiring new gear? The GPS which should help us stay found or the PLB which would allow us to eliminate the search part if we do become lost and are overdue.

Thoughts?

In my mind, the PLB. You can learn map & compass navigation skills if you don't have experience. Its plenty possible to navigate without a GPS. The most important thing is to know where you are and don't try and navigate in an area above your skill range.

However if you become injured and unable to move, knowing where you are doesn't help much (GPS won't do you any good with a broken leg). Having something that can tell others where you are would be much better. Plus on the off chance you get lost, and your life is in peril, it can help there too.

Not to mention if all your navigation requires a GPS, what happens if it runs out of batteries, or otherwise breaks.

What does "tired and dehydrated" mean exactly? Dehydrated could be anywhere from slight discomfort to close to death.

As a general observation, lots and lots of people fail to drink ENOUGH when outdoors, even if water is abundant. Cleaning water takes time and resources, no matter what method you're using.

It's not only about having the right gear - you have to know how to use it. In this case the gear can be as simple as a pot, and the knowledge part is simply being aware that you should use that pot a lot more than your reflexes and feeling of thirst and general discomfort tells you.

The GPS is an EXCELLENT tool for showing not only where you are, but where you should go - and where you have been. The last part is also important because your track should tell you that you're heading in the wrong direction.

Being able to check that the datum of your map and GPS match is a very basic, essential GPS skill that you should know before heading into the brush. Same with declination.

That being said, I have to disagree that user errors on declination or datum would have been a likely cause of more confusion. The difference between the relevant datums in that area (nad27? nad24? versus the wgs-84) would have been how much exactly? My guesstimate is less than 1 km, perhaps someone with knowledge about the most likely maps over that area (BruceZed?) would like to chime in. Say the difference is half a kilometer. This is plenty for the GPS coordinates to put you, say on the east river bank when you're absolutely to the west of it. Which will cause confusion and perhaps make you distrust the GPS. However, the map display on your GPS (if you have one - most units sold today do!) will show your positon without any datum shifts, and with your TRUE heading (prior to any declination errors).

IMO, the GPS should not be discarded as a VERY valuable navigation tool based on a few stories about user errors. Some people will make mistakes and be led astray in a peculiar set of circumstances. Many, many thousands more have been saved from NOT having a 3 day survival episode. You never hear anything about them.


The biggest problem with a GPS is a combination of these factors
- it is so easy and intuitive to use that it undermines the motivation to learn and train basic navigation skills (map and compass)
- the batteries will die (bring spares!)
- a solid knock or a tiny drop of whater in the wrong place is all it takes to kill even the most robust GPS

Navigation with a good old fashioned paper maps and compass is an essential wilderness survival skill, no matter how fancy your GPS is. Unless, of course, you actually enjoy being lost and totally helpless when the unit dies.

There rescuers said they were dehydrated so some part of their water purification system was not working. [/quote]

Somewhere it should be pointed out that when thirsty and dehydrated, it is important to drink water and stay hydrated, even if the water is polluted.

Two things: There is a good chance the water is fine to drink without treatment, especially in pristine or fairly pristine mountain environments when there are no obvious contaminating sources in the watershed (the higher you are the better).

Second - even if the water is polluted, it is far better to stave off the immediate effects of dehyrdation, which can all too soon render you DRT. If you incur a case of diabolical flunkabetis, you will at least be back in town where the situation can be treated.

Wandering around the mountains of Arizona in the 50s, I and my companions drank freely from untreated water sources on many occasions. Cases of water borne illness - exactly none. That was a time when very few were backpacking or climbing, so we may have been fortunate.

I would be more cautious today, but if there were no other way, I would drink up, stay hydrated, and deal with the consequences later.

Lastly, "dehydrated" is a very imprecise term, as has been pointed out. Most of us probably hike most of the time in what is actually a mildly dehydrated state.

Here is a short Youtube video (not my video) of the rough, general area the hikers were probably in. The closest I have been to that area is on the other side of the mountain on the right in the video at about 34 seconds

GPS will tell you with very good accuracy where you are on the WGS-84 Geode, but lets assume some worse case errors which can occur for a common GPS unit with an inbuilt electronic compass and a paper map (NAD27)

Lets assume that the NAD27 datum hasn't been selected on the GPS reciever and instead is set to the default WGS-84 datum is at its maximum - this will be around 200m.

Lets assume that that WAAS is turned off (default) and the GPS etc has a somewhat limited sky view poor HDOP etc and the GPS error is 40m

Lets assume that the Magnetic declination is quite high at 16 degrees and the Magnetic declination has not been accounted for in the GPS, and it remains zero, i.e. the GPS has been set to True North.

Lets assume that you want to get to a way point on the NAD 27 map and you are using the electronic GPS compass, which has a +-2 degree error and the waypoint you need to navigate to is on a grid bearing of 0 degrees 1000m i.e. 1Km directly north on the NAD27 grid.

If all these errors combine in the worst case we have 200 + 40 + (sin (2 + 16) x 1000) = approx 550 metres away from the waypoint. The situation can get even worse if the Mag declination is entered incorrectly on the GPS i.e. 16 degrees East is entered on the GPS as 16 degrees West.

Now if you happen to now come across a another trail (which may well be the incorrect one) and you let it do the navigating for you then you could quite easily end up being turned around.

But GPS should allow you though to fix this problem quite readily by telling you where you are again once more with another fix, the difficulty once again is if the GPS has not been setup properly (as the GPS user doesn't know how to), is getting the GPS to tell you which direction to go to get back on track.

But once the same mistake is made again and you head off in the wrong direction once more then the navigational panic will probably start.

Even with GPS systems with electronic maps (most GPS electronic maps are inadequate i.e lacking contour height detail information compared to the paper formats), skill is also required to think in 3 dimensions when working with nothing really anything more than contour map lines you find at the higher altitudes.

I hesitate to get too picky, particularly if I wasn't there -- and who knows about the accuracy of press accounts.

Still, to be so completely turned around does seem like a lack of basic outdoor skills. You can't take along a compass as an amulet or lucky charm; you have to know how to use it. In this case, even a consideration of "which general direction should the sun lie in if we want to go east?" might have been really helpful. You have to keep an eye on the big picture in navigation.

HJ

Am_Fear_Liath_Mor,

Thanks for illustrating the various sources of errors in GPS navigation.

I have one little caveat: The GPS simply isn't used the way you describe. The electronic compass is just a useless battery hog. The best, easiest and most intuitive way to use a GPS is to use waypoints and see how your position is displaced on the GPS screen in relaton to those waypoints.

Tell your GPS "I want to go to that waypoint (or place your marker on the map)" and you have lots of fancy graphics showing you if you are dead on or need to veer left or right. No need to ever use the compass, neither electronic nor conventional (but you need the conventional as a backup).

So the most relevant inaccuracy is the difference between the different datums (nad27 versus wgs-84). In your example you've used 200 meters. In my neck of the woods, the difference can be as much as 400 meters between ED50 (European datum, 1950, still used on many nautical maps and some really old topo maps) and WGS-84. And - that difference is only relevant when you do translate coordinates from your paper map to your GPS, or vice versa. The GPS map display will show your correct position, no matter what datum the GPS is set to. (And yes, even the best GPS map display is totally inferior to a good topo map, which gives you both the fine details and a large overview without a need to zoom in or out).


200 or 400 meters may be close to insignificant or really make you doubt both the GPS and your mapping skills - it depends of what kind of features that is between your real and your fake position. It could send you down the wrong trail, into the wrong water shed (valley) or put you on the wrong side of a river or a road. But a glimpse on the gps map display would set you right.

There is also an inaccuracy when dealing with the coordinate grid of a topo map. On a 1:50.000 map with a one kilometer UTM grid you are really good if you can do that with 100 meter accuracy (plus/minus 50 meters, or one millimeter on that scale). A user inaccuracy of 400 meters when tired, under stress and so on is entirely plausible.

If the party is too clueless to set up the GPS right, then they're quite likely to be clueless regarding terrain association and general landnav awareness. I have had people as diverse and supposedly knowledgable as pilots and SAR techs not be able to explain to me what the difference is between NAD27 and WGS84 datums. I've asked said personnel "what datum do you use with your GPS system?" and the answer was "decimal degrees". Further prodding did not yield anything close to the correct answer.

You can dream up all kinds of accumulated errors to be made with the GPS. But if that's the case, the people are also not going to be able to get all Lewis & Clark with they're big bad selves and be geniuses with map, compass, and terrain association.

The GPS is a fantastic tool in the hands of a capable user. Don't blame the horse for the rider's failure.

Even without having a full picture of the facts, it's still clear that they made some very basic errors and didn't seem to be very outdoor savvy. They were fortunate to run across a cabin. Reading the article it sounds like they had access to water but couldn't treat it. I agree 100% with the previous posters- drink the water and deal with the consequences later. In that area the water was probably fine, and of course it's easier to treat illnesses caused by water borne pathogens than it is to treat death from dehydration.

There's a risk of being a "Monday morning quarterback" but cases like this do offer instruction to us. We should examine cases like these to glean insights that can teach us something. It's easy to get turned around. The worst thing they did once they realized they were lost is to keep moving. It's human nature but the worst thing you can do. I'm not sure why they didn't build a signal fire once they reached the cabin; did they not have any means to build one or did it not occur to the them?

If they had STOPPED when they realized they were lost, they could have:

* Built a fire to boil water, and they would have had time to let it cool down and then boil more until they and all their water containers were full.

* Enlarged the fire and make it smoky as a marker signal.

* Reduced the cost of the search. If they had to pay for it, this would probably have been a consideration, wouldn't it?

But since it didn't occur to them to STOP, they didn't have time to boil water or create a signal fire.

NO TEA??? How awful! I couldn't do that. Just imagine how many lives have probably been saved simply because one person in the group simply insisted that they stop to build a fire and make tea before blundering onward in the wrong direction.

Sue

Three words we drive into the brains of our Scout from the time they are 5 years old:

Hug A Tree!

When you think you're lost, STOP!

I not not disagree about GPS error. Given the right circumstances and lack of knowledge a GPS can certainly lead you astray. GPS error is one of the many errors (map error, datum error, compass sighting error, etc) we are confronted with in wilderness navigation.

But they did not have a GPS and I think of a GPS as simply part of a good wilderness navigators toolbelt. In my opinion it could have been helpful to tell them that they were at least going away from there trailhead, not getting closer. In fact they were in the "Wrong Province" (state) and heading on a water course towards the pacific ocean, not towards the prairies.

Navigational panic, like any other form of stress induced panic can set-in, hopefully in a survival situation you will recover enough to recheck your tools and look at where you may have made mistakes and correct those errors.

Absolutely, STOP would have got them rescued at least two days earlier.

A few posts have suggested that the women were reading their compass incorrectly. After reading the original article again and looking at some maps, that might not actually be the case.

Unfortunately the language in that article is imprecise, it states:

The women thought they were hiking back toward Upper Kananaskis Lake - but they had become turned around and were headed in the opposite direction, into B.C.

If they were where I think they were, they were basically hiking around a few peaks; heading into BC through the North Kananaskis Pass and heading back into Alberta through the South Kananaskis Pass. Roughly speaking this would require them to head SW and then at one point switch to a SE bearing.

If they missed the point where they needed to change their bearing they could have been "headed in the opposite direction, into B.C." as the article states while still being on a correct bearing, technically speaking (e.g., still heading SW, knowing they were headed SW). The error then would have been determining their actual position on the map as opposed to being an issue with their compass skills. I don't know if this was the case, but it seems like a reasonable possibility.

My map of the area says: "The trail from North Kananaskis Pass to Palliser River and north to Palliser Pass is overgrown, but passable. (not for the inexperienced)"

Interestingly, my trail book (highly regarded, but one edition old) shows a route between these passes on the BC side which is not shown on my (more up to date) topo / trail map. Trail 100 in this diagram is the one I am thinking of (this is from the trail book, not the map, obviously):



Interestingly the difference between my topo and the book is the section of trail between LeRoy Creek and Beatty Lake.

Based on the description from the article, it also sounds like this is the general area where the women were found (it said they were "by the Palliser River near Beatty Creek").

Regarding the dehydration, this is described as a fairly strenuous hike and we have been having weather as hot as it gets up this way, for what that's worth.

Denis, hot weather, is, what, like 20 celcius?
I kid, I kid.

water wise, I count 6 lakes, a river and 2 creeks on that map. Don't know the scale, but since it's a loop, I'd assume it's a fairly large scale map. Still, those lakes didn't get there by magic.

Again, haven't looked at the article, but someone pointed out that electronics could have saved the day. So could have knowing your limitations and not going out in the first place.

Glockaroo, you mention supposedly well informed people not being able to tell the difference in GPS systems. Include me in them. I've never even touched a GPS machine.

Absolutely, we've seen high twenties ... even got into the low thirties a couple times! That's hot for here


For scale, my book lists trail 100 as 10.5 km. I haven't been there, so I don't know for sure how easy the water access is, but I'd lean towards them being dehydrated simply because they didn't drink enough as opposed to not having access to water. That's just a guess though.

As an aside, I took to heart Chris Townsend's caution in The Backpacker's Handbook about treating water. His caution was that insisting that you treat all your water, while not making sure you drink enough water, was worse than simply drinking untreated water to start with. This was based on his experience running into people who wouldn't drink untreated water, but wouldn't filter enough to meet their body's needs (possibly due to effort?).

Aye, but that's the rub. The people I mentioned rely on GPS frequently but aren't informed very well about it. You have no culpability since you don't use the technology.

Touche.

But I'm sure someone's going to ask for my ETS-card for not playing with a GPS

First a quick story:
Long before GPS sats entered orbit (dark ages) I was in Naval flight training and one part of the syllabus had us flying low-level navigation flights in Utah/Nevada.

The route for that day was rather simple; the first leg headed west iirc and all you had to do was count ridge-lines before turning south down a valley for the bulk of the flight. Lots of stuff to see to stay on track and on time. Rather than counting ridge-lines, one of the other students used his stop-watch and turned on time -- he turned down the wrong valley and although he thought he was seeing his checkpoints go by, everything after that first turn was simply wrong. That's the point.

and now back to our hikers:

These three turned down the wrong water-shed (valley) and after that everything was wrong, but from the ground it probably looked like it was supposed to look. They were lost and had no clue.

The $million$ spent on a GPS satellite constellation, the least we can do is spend $100 or so on a GPS receiver so we can access the input. You do not need to buy the latest; the old Garmin Geko 301 I have attached to my mountain bike still works great and that one on eBay is only ~$25 as I type. No maps, but cheap, small and after you add your waypoints, it will tell you how close and what direction -- a simple and cheap investment.

If you have no idea how to use a map and compass, it might be wise to get an understanding of basic navigation principles because even a good GPS cannot fix total ignorance.

Some of us are old enough to remember a time before GPS. Continents were crossed, mountains were climbed, rivers were run, seas were traversed without GPS, somehow, someway.

It is a cool technology that is very helpful in many ways. But it is not a necessary tool for one to find the way through.

I have used a GPS since 1991. It is very helpful in giving a positive location to (in my case) newly discovered archaeological sites, among other things. I will shortly go out for a bike ride, and my faithful Garmin Foretrex will chart my mileage, track, and speed. Definitely a neat gadget.

In a survival situation, I would much prefer to have a decent map and compass. Neither requires battery power or exterior technology, either of which could be limited in a true emergency. I will continue to use GPS, but I don't regard the technology as critical.

Hikermor, the Head Luddite

Well said! And a great story. The trickiest part about being lost is realizing you're geographically confused. Your mental idea of where you are takes precedence, and any evidence that really should tell you that you are somewhere else will be ignored. It can be very hard to realize you need to scrap that mental idea and start all over again.

Of all the other navigation tools on our belt, the GPS is the one that is easiest to use and will most consistently aid people out of their geographical confusion. More often than not, even pretty ignorant people can sucessfully use a GPS.

No tool is perfect. But as long as you have batteries the GPS will steer you right. Despite the flaws we've discussed in so much detail in this thread.

I keep hearing the issue with batteries and that the GPS is useless without them, but if used with a map/compass, the batteries in a GPS can last a very long time. Turn it on and take a good fix. Mark that spot as a waypoint on the GPS and transfer the geo-fix to your map. Turn the GPS off.

Your new set of batteries has been used all of maybe 5 minutes and in the Geko's case, a set of alkaline batteries is good for an advertised 9 hours. If you use those 9 hours 5 minutes at a time, battery life is measured in days/weeks. In those days/weeks, being lost is not an issue.

$.02

Yup, in orienteering we call that "creative landscaping".



Exact-a-mundo. Use lithiums and the lifespan is even longer, with improved reliability in cool weather.

I've used a Garmin Vista HCx for years but over time I have realized that I almost always just need to get point position. The fancier features have not been necessary for me. I am itching to replace it with the smaller, lighter, and IMO more rugged Garmin Foretrex 401. The 401 has Garmin's high sensitivity chip, which is mandatory; I've never failed to get good results under heavy forest canopy. It's down to $167 shipped at Amazon now, and I get paid this week...

For those who will never need to use the Garmin Foretrex 401's electronic compass and baro altimeter, the Garmin Foretrex 301 has the same ergo's and high sensitivity receiver, and it's less expensive.

For Garmin: with a high sensitivity receiver, the GPS derived altitude could be more accurate than the barometric since you need to know the local baro pressure to calibrate. My GPS V calculates altitude just fine and quite accurately without a high sensitivity receiver and with no barometric altimeter.

I get usefully accurate altitudes with my now discontinued Foretrex 101. My driveway slab is precisely 200 feet above sea oevel. The other day my Foretrex gave an altitude of 204 feet. I thought, that's pretty close, and then realized I was holding it at waist level...

The 101 does not alwaysgive an accurate reading, especially when first turning it on, but it will settle down and provide good info.

I've noticed a lot of the newer GPS receivers don't have altitude displayed unless they have the baro altimeter. Will the Foretrex 301 display altitude?

I'll add a bit of personal perspective here as I have hiked in this area a couple of times. The trip from the Upper Kananaskis lake day area to Three Isle lake or the branch up to Turbine Lake are both very popular hikes. In fact the area north of Turbine lake has a glacier that is used by the Canadian ski team for their summer conditioning. (I literally bumped into them on a training run!) There is a ranger cabin on the east side of the Continental Divide not far from the campground.

But once you get over the North Pass you are in territory where few people go. It is more rugged and the trails are almost invisible. In fact if you try to backtrack and climb back up the pass you are in for an ordeal because the trail is a lot harder to climb than to descend. The best bet is to head for the river in the valley where it opens up into some meadows and easier hiking. The west mountain side is pretty disorientating and easy to get lost there because the west side gets more rain and thus also a denser growth of trees and bushes. The mountains are pretty steep on the west side too. This trail isn't used nearly as much as the east side. However there best route on the west side is actually at the bottom of the valley near the river -- this is part of the Canadian Continental Divide trail.

This is grizzly country -- the last time I was there, there were 2 juvenile grizzlies recently kicked out by mama bear in the area and another grizzly south-west of Three Isle lake and another around Mt. Indefatigable. The area they were lost in is occasionally closed due to their activities. I never saw the bears myself but a nature photographer I passed 2x was basically going back down as fast as he could because he encountered them and was a bit scared.

I can see how they could get disorientated in this area. They would not have had an issue with water as there are meltwater streams everywhere from the snow peaks. Giardia is probably not much of a concern, certainly not in comparison to being lost! The search teams were probably searching the obvious east side of the divide which is where they hikers thought they were on and thus didn't spend as much search time on the west side.

Canadian Rockies Trail Guide

Or simply forgetting to drink enough water when they hiking about. Since dehydration can happen in a couple of hours, they may have been concentrating on finding their direction and not enough time on drinking water.

The other day in Grasslands NP, I hiked for 7 hours in 32-35*C heat and drying winds and went through 4 litres of water via 2 water bottles and a 3-litre platypus. Using a platy and sip tube made hydrating myself easy. If they were relying on water bottles alone then I think it is easier to forget about drinking enough.

In their case, a GPS receiver would have required a lot of batteries. Consider that they were out for 3 days plus they were lost for an additional 3 days, they may or may not have had enough batteries to last that long even if only using it for the hours they were hiking.

Again, only if you leave the GPS receiver on constantly. Turn it on, mark the position on both the GPS and on your paper map, turn the GPS off. 5 minutes out of the 9-18 hour battery life typical with a modern GPS. One set of batteries can go many days.

One fix with a GPS would have shown them they were nowhere near where they thought they were located.

They would have had to rest at night so the gps wouldn't be running all the time. even hiking half the day or more will be only one set of batteries per day. I carry a dozen in my backpack so thats 6 days of constant gps use though out the day.

GPS battery usage...

I recently returned from a trip to the BWCA, where I had my GPS on all the time that we were canoeing and portaging which was 4-6 hours a day for the four days we were out.

I usually use either NiMH or Alkaline batteries and expected to need a set of batteries for each day's travel.

My canoe partner suggested Lithium batteries -- and we completed the trip on a single set.