How about one simple change in the rules for climbers?
When you go backcountry camping along the Pacific beaches in Olympic National Park, you are required to have a hard-sided for food and scented items. This is actually because the raccoons there have figured out how to get into every other kind of protective container, including non-hard-sided bearproof sacks. Understandably, someone who is only an occasional beach camper might be reluctant to invest $70 in a cumbersome, heavy bear canister. This is why canisters are available for loan at the park's Wilderness Information Center for a suggested donation of $3.00.See where I'm going with this?
Why not require all climbers or climbing parties on appropriate mountains to carry locator beacons like the kind that would have likely saved those recently lost on Mount Hood? If they didn't want to shell out $700 for one, the ranger station could have them available for a suggested donation of $30.00. See, the math even works neatly.Don't want to carry a beacon? Fine. Just sign an appropriate waiver form to that effect at the ranger station. It would say that you understand the risks and decline to be rescued if you are overdue. Or maybe you agree to pay the full costs of any rescue, including the wages of those participating in the search as part of their job duties.
posted at 6:05 PM
1 Comments:
Well, that was pretty unwise. Winter in the backcountry is not the time for traveling light. Seems like perhaps there should be better incentives (i.e., the "stick") to encourage people to carry these simple devices. Now, I myself always go into the backcountry without so much as a cell phone (pointless), but nothing I do approaches climbing Mount Hood at this time of year, and with my sleeping bag and a way to stay dry, I could reasonably expect to survive for quite a while barring some really improbable things happening.
It's interesting to speculate that if these climbers had just done what James Kim had done, hang out for a week waiting to be rescued, it's possible they could have survived.
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