"They weren't talking themselves out of the situation they were calling out - ie. making noise to ward off the precesnce of the bear".

Oh, I read it and understood it perfectly. But it DIDN'T WORK, did it? What was Plan B?

Lots of people go out into the wilderness every day and don't have a bear problem. That's probably because there aren't any bears around. What's the death and injury rate when there are?

Granted, feeding the bear one of the group would only incur a 20% loss (if there were five), or a paltry 14% loss if there were seven. Is that considered acceptable?

NOLS seems to have the same kind of planning mentality that governments usually have for their disaster plans: They prepare for the best-case scenarios instead of the worst-case scenarios.

NOLS is a non-profit organization with 14 on their board of trustees. Next time, send one of the trustees across the river first. That way, I'll bet company policy will change more quickly, unless their donors and grant sources do it first.

Glock-A-Roo: I can't find anything online regarding the NOLS accident and death rate history. Can you help me with this? The Wikipedia entry is more an advertising spiel than anything else, obviously written by themselves.

And I am not downplaying the response of the victims. It appears that they did an incredible job in all respects. I would say that they probably did a better job than most adults.

Sue