I never said it was dangerous, but it WAS a parallel situation in being ignored, despite a headcount.
I’m sure that, if worst came to worst, I could have simply eaten a couple of the tourists.
Wise words, those.
I’d also recommend that this HR Department sever all ties with Donner Party Outdoor Adventures,
Like … immediately.
This was eminently preventable, and far too close to catastrophic.
The funniest part of the story is that it appears to have been part of a “team building” exercise.
It’s kinda obvious that they violated all the basic wilderness rules. Good that it didn’t end in tragedy.
It’d be awesome if it was the boss.
That’s got to be pretty toxic no matter who it was. I wouldn’t want to work with people who left me to die on a mountain. And is feel really weird working with a guy that i abandoned, even if he was pigheaded about going on alone.
Agreed, but have we evidence that he was pig-headed?
Can we do that after the annual barbeque?
Only that he chose to continue to the summit when everyone else turned back. But i didn’t mean to imply he was, only that even if that’s what his co-workers thought of him, they must feel pretty guilty today.
I think we suffer from news story-speak and lack of information about their conversations.
This post right here is why I love the Dope.
I really wasn’t trying to make a judgement. Just considering how incredibly awkward that office must be today. No matter how it went down.
Was that because they had already reached the summit, though? Or did they decide to turn back before they reached. One is perhaps, maybe, pigheadedness, the other is just not quite being able to keep up.
Also, from the Denver Post article TL linked to upthread, I’m wondering if the trail “markers” that were removed weren’t so much proper markers as random articles of clothing that they decided to leave behind as impromptu markers:
The man reached the peak of Mount Shavano around 11:30 a.m. but, when he turned to descend the mountain, became disoriented when he found that the group had picked up the belongings being used as trail markers as they hiked down before him, according to search and rescue officials.
He tried to make his way down the mountain, but he quickly got turned around and found himself in the steep boulder and scree field on the northeast slopes toward Shavano Lake, search and rescue officials said.
ETA: As bad as it was, even for (presumably) a bunch of amateurs, it’s still not as bad as what happened to that Marine I mentioned above. In this case, they at least were in communication trying to help him find the trail and ensured a search effort was launched the same day. Plus, you know, he didn’t die!
Okay, that was really funny.
As @susan said he fell 20 times while trying to get down. After the last fall, he couldn’t get up. Fortunately he eventually got cell coverage where he was lying and called 911. It was a serious situation.
It seems obvious that his coworkers should have stuck with him, but likewise he shouldn’t have tried to summit alone. It’s a challenging hike; novice or expert, he is an adult and should have thought better.
This article has a few more details including the timeline from up-thread:
I’m not sure if we even know that. Had at least some of the others also summited, and were just a bit ahead of him, with nobody paying attention to the fact that he’d become far enough back to be out of sight? Or did they have a discussion in which everyone else said ‘we’re going back down’ and he insisted on going further up, even knowing that he’d be doing so alone?
I don’t think there was anything in either of those stories to clarify which of those things happened. If there was, I missed it. – the third story just posted doesn’t clarify it either, except to say that at least some of the others summited; but whether he deliberately separated from the group or just couldn’t keep up still isn’t clear.
And if they’d discussed it so that he knew he’d be alone – then at least someone in the group that picked up the trail markers knew he’d still be up there; which makes it considerably worse than awkward, IMO.
It may have been incompetence on everybody’s part – nobody in the party who knew what they were doing. But if this trip was run by an organization – then it was worse than incompetence on the organization’s part not to have someone with the party who did know what they were doing.
FWIW, the idea of taking an office “team building” trip to a 14K summit seems insane to me, unless maybe it’s a major tourist spot like Fuji (which is actually more like 12K). But some random peak in Colorado, that apparently doesn’t even have a well-marked trail all the way to the top? Absolutely insane. Even at 12K, the altitude kicks the wind out of you if, like me, you’re not acclimated to that sort of thing.
I do a fair amount of hiking, but never above 10K feet (except that one time up Fuji). I have contemplated a trip to CO to do a 14K, but I have a specific peak in mind with a well-worn trail.
And I’d wager I am in better shape than the average random office worker.
The real villain here is whoever thought this was a suitable team building exercise for a bunch if office workers.
I just assumed it’s Colorado, this is what amounts to a team building exercise there.
I did some light hiking at around 10k-11k feet in Utah, on well-marked trails, with a friend who stayed with me. It was tiring to walk in the parking lot the first day i arrived, although i was in much better shape when i came back a few days later.
But even without altitude issues, mountains are dangerous beasts. Mt. Washington, in NH, is only 6288’ tall, and it claims a few lives most years. Weather, exposure, falls… you just don’t leave people alone in the mountains.
It really is unclear. The last article says
with a group completing summit attempts and a separate group ascending to the saddle
and
one was left to complete the summit push alone.
It is hard for me to really imagine a group of people acting in this manner. But it sounds as though the folk who wanted to summit - except this one guy - summitted and were descending, at which point this guy chose to make his own summit attempt. A quote from one of the previous articles gave me the same impression.
Why on earth the guy wouldn’t have been with the group that summitted is inexplicable. And it is really hard to imagine the group saying, “Sure, go on ahead, while we leave you alone, descend, and remove the markers.”
It’s possible there was some Dunning-Kruger going on. Like I said, I don’t hike above 10K feet, but I hike enough (and I’ve been on at least one hike above 10K) that I realize just how much of a challenge a 14K summit would be as a novice at that altitude. If I were to do it, I would do all kinds of research and, as noted, would be sure to pick out a peak with a well-marked trail at a bare minimum.
I could see how someone who spends even less time outdoors might not even think that a 14K peak should be any special challenge requiring special precautions for a novice group. Especially if they live in Colorado and think that mere proximity to such heights confers genuine familiarity with the challenges of surmounting them. Heck, I remember hiking up Mt. Guadalupe in Texas (tallest point in Texas, but a little more than half the altitude of the summit these folks tried to get to the top of) and I remember a group with some young adult/urban youth enrichment organization starting out in the morning happy and energetic, and not even able to make it halfway up by the time I had reached the top and was on my way down (we had started together—and in fact many of them had already decided to turn back before the halfway point—or rather the quarterway point, since that would have only been halfway to the summit).
Now, if I’m wrong and someone in that group does have a lot of experience hiking, perhaps even above 10K feet… then I think that person is a real idiot for not ensuring more precautions were taken. A wizard should know better.