How to Die in a National Park

Interesting short article in the current national Geographic summarizing fatalities in the National Park System 2007-2011. 37% were due to drowning, 23% to motor vehicle accidents, and 18% to falling. 0.6% were due to animal attacks, exceeded in frequency by poisoning (0.9%), bicycle accidents (1%), avalanches (2%),plane crashes (3%) and exposure (4%).

I would bet this profile is generally representative of outdoor recreationists overall in most of the USA.

You might be interested in an article from "Wilderness and Environmental Medicine", 20, 244-249 (2009) called Dead Men Walking: Search and Rescue in US National Parks.

It turns out that hiking accounts for 48% of SAR missions, boating 21%, swimming 6%, and climbing only 5%.

Lots of other interesting information in the article.

Thank you, AKSAR. Very informative reference.

I suppose a next question is what percentage of park visitors engage in each activity, that is, what are the statistical risks of death for engaging in each.

I wonder how many of those start off their SAR adventure by simply getting lost.

Air, speed, and gravity - they'll get you every time.

There's a couple of good books by Michael Ghiglieri detailing the deaths in two of the nations most popular parks, Grand Canyon and Yosemite. It supplies the statistics on the various causes of deaths, but more importantly they research the actual events that happened and provide a details on what led up to it. Some of the causes are fairly predictable, but others are somewhat unexpected.


http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=micael+ghigleri

I imagine falling would be my biggest risk of those listed, followed by an untreated snakebite (or both yikes!).

Here is a link to three years of Ray Mears shows on BBC. I whiled away the hours of several rainy days watching these videos.

Several of the episodes investigate the deaths of people who were engaged in outdoor activities, interviewing families or friends of victims, officials, and experts....the production values are top notch, and the material was fascinating.

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/ray-mears-extreme-survival/

I believe statistics for various activities are available that have been calculated independently of venue, in other words, not necessarily within units of the National Park system. Years ago, I saw a show on PBS which discussed the various hazards of sundry outdoor activities. What stuck in my mind was that the accident rate for rock climbing was identical to the accident rate for driving in the automobile - a pretty good example of how we accept the hazards of a commonplace activity and emphasize the hazards of something exotic and unusual.

Sorry, I can't quote you a definitive source for the stats, but they are out there somewhere....

at the canoeing site when the subject of "how to die" comes up most everyone says it's the drive up they worry about and not the canoe trip.

Josey wales (fictional,but cool)"Dyin' ain't much of a livin'!Since this is Equipped to Survive,Shouldn't we be reading:How NOT to die in a National Park? OTOH,Most national parks are beautiful places,& to actually croak your carcass in one,by whatever means,has got to be better than say,getting flattened by a steam roller in Dumpwater,Delaware,Right?

I have recovered bodies from within National Parks, and from outdoor venues that were not National Parks. I doubt that locality makes any difference, although Grand Canyon does seem to be an intentional choice for many suicide victims. Some years ago the librarian at Grand Canyon, while on a solo hike, found a suicide victim hanging from a tree on the South Rim. Said she had finally found her man.

The main thing for me is the low incidence of animal attacks compared to the more common ways of dying - and that is all animal attacks, including honey bees. We obsess way too much about bears, although I would wager that if you are attacked by a bear, whether you are within or without a NP probably isn't very significant.

The Grand Canyon book was very good.