Missing hikers find SAR helicopter

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/nati...5703/story.html

A couple in their 60's, missing for seven days after a hike, walked out of the British Columbia bush and up to an idling SAR helicopter in a clearing -- just as the search was being called off.

Temperatures for the week were soaring -- up to 40 C.

Their families were in another SAR helicopter flying over the area to say their final goodbyes. They got the news while in the air, above the couple's last known location.

Apparently the couple didn't see what all the fuss was about. Though they were down to their last TicTac.

The number of things these folks did to get themselves in trouble is classic. Even so they did a thing or two right. I guess it goes to show how small choices can turn the tide in your favour.

Sounds like they got lucky!

Not sure why they were given up on when temperatures were HIGH.

Cold, sure, but high temps shortening survival? In the woods where there is shade? and likely water?

If I read the article right it was only 6 days.

Even with shade, 40C (104F) is well into heat stroke territory. Thankfully, the couple had enough sense to stay put, in a lean to, near a water supply.



Shades of Gary Paulsen's "Hatchet"

Yeah there are heat advisories all over the globe
and lots of folks don't know how to cope
and lots of governments and news outlets don't warn people adequately

Consider this story I saw the other day
Karachi heat wave claims over 1,000 lives in Pakistan ... 44.8 degrees Celsius (112.64 degrees Fahrenheit)
Stench of death in Pakistan should shame government
Opinion: Pakistan's heat wave: When fasting is a sin
in india last month death toll had risen to 2,330. The highest maximum temperature recorded on was 47 C or 116.6 F
2015 Pakistani heat wave
2015 Indian heat wave


In california I've often heard of employers being fined by Cal/OSHA for failing to provide water to workers (construction, farm workers)


Its easy to see how rescuers are less than optimistic,
by their average experience searching for six days might have been extremely optimistic,
people perish in heat waves even when they're not lost,
they just don't know what to do
or are just too poor.

"Even with shade, 40C (104F) is well into heat stroke territory. Thankfully, the couple had enough sense to stay put, in a lean to, near a water supply."

Many people work all day everyday in 40c temps. If water is available, no reason to believe they wouldn't make it.

Helicopters are dangerous, I can see stopping a search due to the risk of the copters hazards over time. But other search techniques would be appropriate, for example using attraction (which the chopper did in this case inadvertently) which can be done with little risk to personnel.

As always, I would assume the media only gets the story half right, at best.

The decision to stop a search is never easy, and depends on a number of factors. The chance of survival is only one of them.

If no clues have been found after 6 days of thorough searching, the question becomes what do we do now? Do we search the same area again, on the chance that we've missed something? Or do we expand the search area? If we expand the area, how far out do we go? Remember, the potential search area goes up by the square of distance from the last known position of the subjects. If you have already searched the most likely areas and found no clues, how much bigger can you hope to make the search area?

Another consideration is available resources for searching. I'm assuming most (if not all) of the ground pounders are volunteers, taking time off from work or family. After 6 days, they may well have burned through most if not all the available resources. Ask yourself how much of your time would you be willing to volunteer to search for someone you don't know?

Helicopters are very expensive search resources. And even if most of the ground pounders are volunteers, there are probably a number of RCMP paid personnel running the operation. Given the amount of complaining one hears these days from the public about the cost of SAR, after 6 days the search managers may well have felt under considerable pressure to wind down the search.

Two additional links with a few more details:

http://bc.ctvnews.ca/hikers-survive-week-in-b-c-wilderness-with-2-oranges-3-cookies-1.2445693

http://www.pentictonwesternnews.com/news/311060821.html?mobile=true

@clearwater: I agree that people who are regularly exposed to high temperatures become acclimatized and can function. The same is true of cold temps. It's a process that takes time. I have a terrible time with high temps; it took me two weeks to start to acclimatize to Hawaii in the summer, while all around me were Californians thankful to escape the heat.

My guess is that the search was called off because the searchers couldn't find the slightest indication of the hikers, who had apparently hunkered down in a place that was hidden from aerial view, possibly outside of the defined search area. Dogs and ground searchers couldn't find a trace either.

Doug, thanks for the update. It sounds like a very big search. And they ended up only a few kilometers from the search base! It reminds me of an incident some years back up in Denali Park. Two young women, summer employees of one of the hotels, decided to do a short backpack in the park on their days off.

Long story short they really got lost, but kept walking. NPS did a big search, lots of volunteers, helicopters, dogs, the Full Monty. The rangers thought they had defined a big enough search area. However, two fit (but clueless) young women can walk a long way. The walked clear out of the search area.

The search had gone on for many days, with no clues found. The girls were from outside of Alaska, only up here for summer jobs. The parents flew up here. The head ranger was actually sitting down with the parents in his office to tell them that nothing had been found and the search would be soon winding down. Suddenly the cell phone of the mother of one of the girls rang. It was the missing daughter! "Mom...help...we are lost!"

Turns out they had actually wandered way out of the search area, actually outside the park boundary, and slightly closer to the main highway. Luckily they ended up on a hilltop and got a marginal cell signal. Rather than do the seemingly obvious thing and call 911, the first thing the girl did was call her mother in North Carolina! Except that her mom was now in Alaska, in the head rangers office, getting the sad news that they might not find her daughter.

You just never know.

I can see winding up the search after 6 days of no signs.
The heat is a threat to the searchers and the aircraft so that's a decision point for the sake of the rescuers.

But that's different from writing off the lost folks for only being out 6 days - even if it's hot. Assuming they were too dumb to get in the shade and find water is heading for the lowest possible denominator. (Maybe that's all that journalists know?)

Cellphones - I hear it frequently on the scanner that a person in trouble calls a friend rather than 911. Mental muscle memory or something. Or maybe it's too hard to find the dialing number pad on modern phones? (I dunno, my cellphone is 12 years old and it has number buttons)

That's actually a basic psychology, I guess: "The phone is working now as usually? Then, that's not a life threatening situation anymore...". Amazing stories indeed. I just wonder, for how many days girls' phone survived without charging? Have no trust in mine even carrying it with the battery out. So the solar panel is always with me on the trail.