Posted on 12/05/2006 9:18:33 AM PST by george76
Searchers intensified their efforts Tuesday to find a San Francisco man missing for more than a week in a rugged, remote area of the snow-covered Oregon Coast Range as his wife and two young children, rescued just the day before, recovered in a hospital.
Trained dogs, horse patrols and a helicopter with heat-sensitive sensors were sent to join other helicopters, snowmobiles and foot patrols Tuesday for 35-year-old James Kim.
Trackers had followed his footprints until dark Monday night.
"They determined that he went over the side of the road into the Big Windy Creek drainage area and that's when the two deputies from Jackson County went over the edge and they are tracking his footprints right now," ...Tuesday morning.
"There are some cliffs they may have to go down to get down to the creek.
And there's still snow and ice, cold temperature, but they've been out all night and they plan to be out all day. And their hope is to find him today," ...
Kim...had left his wife and two young children in their frozen, snowbound car and set off into the wilderness to seek help, wearing only tennis shoes, a sweater and a jacket.
State Police Lt. Gregg Hastings said Kati Kim told a detective the family intended to take Oregon 42, the usual route from Interstate 5 to the south Oregon coast, but they missed the turnoff, found Bear Camp Road on the map and decided to take it instead of turning back.
Their car was 15 miles from Bear Camp Road when found.
The complicated network of roads in the area is commonly used by whitewater rafters on the Rogue River or as shortcuts to Gold Beach in the summer, but the roads are not plowed in winter and can be impassable.
(Excerpt) Read more at thedenverchannel.com ...
I love those shows also. The other night a couple got lost in south America close to the amazon river. The same problem in the Oregon forest is that there so many tall trees that it is hard to get your bearings, which way is north, etc. The couple in the show "thought" that camp was north so they started traveling north, however camp was actually south because they had not traveled in a straight line and so they were actually getting farther from camp and deeper into the forest. I agree with a post a while back it usually is better to stay put, or at least stay on the roads.
Same goes for boating. Never ever leave the boat and try to swim for it.
I recall a story some years back about 2 hunters who got caught in a surprise snowstorm right after shooting a prize buck. Their desire to drag the buck to the truck overruled common sense. They got sweaty and their clothes started freezing. THey panicked, got lost and long story short, froze to death.
Wow thats too bad, kind of scary cause it can happen to even experienced outdoors men.
I had a close call one year: Myself and 3 other close friends were climbing Mt Hood (11,235 ft) and we got caught in a whiteout storm. Before that it was a beautiful sunny day. Knowing the area very well we knew what to do, 1st we tried just waiting it out because there are too many crevasses and cliffs to go wandering about basically blind. Once we figured it was getting worse and getting caught on the mt with only a days worth of food and water, we used our compasses to traverse the mt until we got to a land mark we knew existed and followed again our compasses back to the lodge. The key was we knew the area very well before hand.
The old boy scout training came in very well indeed.!
Good idea. I like to look through www.beprepared.com, the emergency kits. I haven't purchased from them or anything (yet), but you can get a good idea, also, they have some good sale prices sometimes.
I see...
Well, we are all here because we're not all there.
Always go downhill...
I think that's the one I saw. His leaving his dad, against all advice and wisdom, was what saved their lives. I hope that this man is found.
Alive. Found alive.
One could always see if those store burglar alarms work! ;^)
LOL!!!
I'm doing this very badly. I meant to write that I hope this man is found alive. I didn't think the family would be found alive and now we have three out of four back safely. Micracles do happen.
The show would be survivorman.
He made a judgement call to go for help after 6 days with no rescue in sight. His family was in a stable (but not good) situation. I think anybody could have made that choice especially seeing their kids freezing and asking to be rescued. It is tough to stay put.
There have been three other similar situations like this in this area over the last few years (at least to what I remember) and in all three of those cases if someone had not left to go get help the families would have never been found. Earlier this year on the same road a family was missing in their RV and they were found because two people left to go get help. If they can't find an RV on a road in the snow how would expect your car to be found.
Can't blame the guy...and if he were found first and brought rescue to the family what would everyone be saying.
He was faced with an impossible situation and he tried to do something about it. Can't fault him for that.
Oh yeah, I mean, unless we are actually THERE, and can look around take full appreciation of the situation, we can't make the call for the guy. He might have decided that chances of them being spotted were slim, he's the only one who can make that call..
It seems like a few people die this way every winter in the Canadian Rockies when they get trapped in a snowstorm on a road trip.
Bookmarking
I seem to recall another family getting lost in this area last year..in those back mountain roads near Gold Beach, OR. In that case, they were in a big camper, had some food and could stay fairly warm. Several people were in the camper. I forgot how they were rescued but after the feel-good stories in the media, it turned out that one of the snowbound fellows was wanted by the police.
As a local, were they 15 miles down the wrong road ?
How far beyond that to a cabin, town, etc. ?
One should be able to walk 2 to 3 miles per hour unless the snow was really high...without snow shoes or a x-c ski.
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