63-year-old injured hiker rescued from Grand Canyon after friends leave him behind
BY Herschel Smith
7 months, 2 weeks ago
That’s the headline. Here’s the story.
63-year-old man suffering traumatic injuries was rescued from the north rim of the Grand Canyon on Friday evening after the group he was hiking with left him behind.
According to a Facebook post by the Mohave County Sheriff’s Office, they received an emergency call from a man using an Apple device through satellite connection at around 6 p.m. on September 15. Search and rescue then deployed via helicopter to the man’s given location at Kanab Creek, but had to land about a quarter mile away due to the difficult terrain and dark conditions.
“It was fortunate that the helicopter was able to rescue this injured hiker, as it would have taken an extended period of time for ground crews to reach his location.”
The rescue crew then proceeded through the creek on foot and located the man, finding him alone having fallen and suffered a shoulder injury that required emergency medical attention. The team was able to stabilize the hiker and transport him via helicopter to a hospital in Flagstaff.
The Sheriff’s Office reports that they don’t know exactly what time the original call was made, but they learned that the injury had occurred four hours prior to the call, at 2 p.m. that day, when the man was hiking with four other friends. Once he contacted authorities, the group, who were reportedly several days into a week-long backpacking trip, left him alone and continued with their hike – something rescuers warn hikers never to do.
Here is the Facebook post from the Mohave County Sheriffs Office Search and Rescue. The commenters are hard on the so-called friends, but not sufficiently hard. I’m going to be harder.
They are no friends of his. In fact, he had a better chance of being assisted by a stranger than friends like that. Man is made in God’s image. Whether your hike is ruined or not, you stay with injured people. Period.
Oh, I realize that there may be extenuating circumstances like someone who believes he can help better by stabilizing the patient and then going for help if there is no communication. But there should have been communication. You don’t go into the Bush without comms (i.e., a satellite uplink). And in fact the call for help was sent that way. They just abandoned him to whatever would befall him.
Had he perished, it wouldn’t be a stretch for me to see them indicted for homicide. Said another way, if this had happened with my party, I might have sent other men for help and stayed with the patient (with the absolutely necessary med kit I carry, including Quikclot, tourniquets, medicines, gauze, etc.) and water, and ensured that the man was lifted out to safety. It would have been my ministry to that man. And God would have been watching me the entire time. I would hear about it in eternity.
That man needs to find other people to hang with. Those are dangerous men to be around. They are the sort of people who take you out into the bush and let you get injured, and then leave you behind to fend off animals, seek out your own water, medicate yourself, and try to effect triage if necessary.
Listen to this. After the call for help, they didn’t even leave him with the Apple device they used to call for help. They just left him there in the dark. What a bunch of jerks.
Folks, no trip is worth leaving a man behind to perish. Don’t leave men on the trail. Don’t walk off from them, even if they’re slower, even if they fall behind, even if you don’t like them. They could get injured and you wouldn’t know because you’re down trail frolicking along your stupid, merry way.
Don’t … leave … men … behind! If you’re part of a party, stay with the party. It’s the right and honorable thing to do.
On September 18, 2023 at 10:31 pm, Heywood said:
Wow. Just…..wow. You arem100% correct…those were not friends.
On September 19, 2023 at 4:26 am, jrg said:
Yeah, not friends. Not even ONE person stayed behind to be sure the injured man was covered ? That is cold. how do you walk away from someone in need like that.
My wife takes weekly motorcycle tours with her group. Not very often, but if one rider has bike issues, at least one other rider will stay behind and make sure everything turns out well. The longer trips often have a truck towing a lo-boy trailer in case a bike decides to call it a day early. Not often used, but it has been a major convenience as sometimes those bikes die at pretty secluded places.
On September 19, 2023 at 5:24 am, RCW said:
Those who abandoned the injured hiker have neither honor nor excuses. Maybe they’ll find time for some sincere contrition, confession and apologies for forgiveness to their Maker and the hiker they trespassed?
On September 19, 2023 at 8:32 am, Carlos the Jackal said:
It would matter how large the group was. I’d say 3-4 people shouldn’t have had a lot of trouble getting him out themselves, even from the very bottom of that canyon.
It was a shoulder injury, not a leg injury, but there seems to be a lack of pertinent info to make a judgement beyond it takes some genuine a-holes to leave an injured man on the trail when it’s getting dark.
On September 19, 2023 at 12:15 pm, Chris said:
“” the group, who were reportedly several days into a week-long backpacking trip, left him alone and continued with their hike””
May seem inconsequential…
…..but I would liked to know the Size of the group.
To convince 1 or 2 people (of anything) to do anything, is hard enough.
But 3, 4 or more..thats too many “Individuals,” ….you would Think.
They couldn’t even spare afew HR’s , heck even A Day…to just sit and wait with him.
How Far We have Fallen.
On September 19, 2023 at 1:44 pm, Kevin said:
The bragging rights for my Ego is WAY!!! more important than the life of another that gets in the way of that. Doncha ya know!
Probably city folk.
On September 19, 2023 at 2:23 pm, Dirk Williams said:
Hmmmm, I don’t think we’re getting the entire story. Any person whom hikes rides flys lives life to the fullest simply has to except the responsibility for their own actions.
If I was the hurt guy, and I’d completed made medical assistance arrangements, I don’t think it unreasonable to cut the group loose let them finish their trip.
In 1996, I was back packing the Rogue River Trail, 50 miles, with my young son and nephew. I tripped maybe five miles into the trip and tore my knee apart. Swollen like a watermelon unbearable pain.
The trip parameters were 10 miles a day. After weighing everything I chose to finish the trip. I instructed the boys to go ahead stick to the trail and I would eventually catch up, and I dragged my leg the entire distance. 10 miles per day.
I slept with my leg in the rogue river in the cold water hoping to get relief. Going down hill was murder. My pack was 40 ish poumds and killed me, I was determined to finish what I started for me, for the boys
I finished, drove home, had knee surgery like three days later.
This was a trip we had planned for years, the logistics of getting my nephew to our home were cumbersome back then.
So I think what I’m saying is. If I can drag my leg 45/40 miles with a back pack on, if this guy was stabilized and could walk to the helo, he was fine on his own.
We humans are far more capable than we realize. Some of us weigh the risks and roll the dice, move forward for a million different reasons. In my application I made it, but then short of death I was determined to finish what I started.
In the story above’s, seems like important details are lacking.
I get all of your positions, I have zero problems with your views, I just see the other side.
Dirk
On September 19, 2023 at 4:37 pm, Rick said:
I agree with Dirk. Too, I think there are a lot of details not jniwn which, when known, you’d change your mind.
As an aside, I wonder how many here have been part of a a group ling distance hike, let alone plan the logistics. In a populat Nat’l park which often requires year in advance registrations.
On September 19, 2023 at 7:44 pm, Herschel Smith said:
Any number of things could have happened, or might occur, regardless of the details given in the report, for any such injury. Including but not limited to: (1) the injury may be more severe than you or the victim thinks, (2) the patient could go into Rhabdo, (3) there may be none injuries beneath the surface that don’t appear to you (after all, you’re not a doctor and have no access to medical equipment), with a severe fracture pouring white blood cells into the blood stream, eventually becoming toxic to the liver, (4), the patient could have become delirious from pain and/or loss of blood, causing him to wander off and die, (5) the patient could have gone into hypothermia in the night, (6) the patient may not have had the presence of mind or strength left to build shelter for himself (even if that shelter is a pop-up tent), (7) the rescue team may not have been able to get him out or even locate him if he wandered off, causing it to become a “search and rescue,” (8) even if the rescuers had been able to get to him, it may have been on foot, causing a minor trauma to become a severe trauma over time, hunger, loss of fluids, blood loss, etc.
And those are just the things off the top of my head.
No, I don’t need more information than the report gives me. They left a man who was injured. If anyone thinks that is okay, he hasn’t done the requisite FMEA (failure mode and effects analysis) — like any thinking man should.
On September 20, 2023 at 6:23 am, Aesop said:
1) I want to hear more details, from both parties, before making a judgement in this case.
2) That said, the decision to not have a couple of folks break off and stay with the guy was asinine in the extreme, at minimum.
3) The book solution isn’t likely to be to carry him out yourselves. Anyone who’s never tried to hump out a single person as part of a litter team needs to STFU about that idea. That’s about the worst plan of all possible choices, other than what they actually did. That approach, even with a proper litter, kicks the asses of young healthy military folks. Joe Backpacker? With only 4 people to start with (meaning no relief)? Unless you were climbing K2, that’s not going to happen, and you are highly unlikely to pull it off successfully for any distance not measured in feet, and more likely to create additional casualties in the attempt, and/or worsen the injured party’s condition. Bad idea in the extreme, outside of special circumstances, like packs of ravenous wolves, a brushfire, or hiking with a group of NFL linebackers.
4) The Right Way: You leave your best medically-trained folks, 2 at minimum, with the injured person. You send your fittest backpacking “animals” to get help, the quickest way out, and with only the gear and supplies they need to get out safely. Including a map out, and with the location of the injured party’s camp marked accurately. Again, 2 at minimum.
This party had the group size to do exactly that. And failed to do it.
Once someone is injured, the trip has become a rescue operation, if we’re talking about “friends”.
Abandoning someone because “the trip”, if that’s how it actually went down, should be castigated at every level possible. AZ has no Bad Samaritan laws as such, no duty to render aid, and minimal negligence laws, and neither does FedGov (this was presumably on federal land) but an earnest investigation into what happened at the state and federal levels, looking at the actions or failures of same by the abandoning parties should at minimum publicly hold their feet to the fire, transparently, and get them pilloried in the press by name unless they can justify their actions.
If the other parties were, in fact, the human slugs it seems, such douchebaggery merits a spotlight, and a good stream of directed ire.
Those people were at best idiots, and at worst feral sub-humans.
The world needs more of neither.
On September 20, 2023 at 10:55 am, Latigo Morgan said:
Dang! Never leave a man behind. Period. No further discussion or info needed.
On September 20, 2023 at 3:22 pm, Dirk Williams said:
We all do things differently to find solutions, no problems with anybody’s final option, FWIW I have humped many dead and injured men women and children out of serious crash’s, I’ve elven carried a few by myself,why because I was that final option.
Not far but Aesop’s spot on, it’s a bitch. Was a time I worked NPS cave and recovery, I’ve come up walls, well cave faces, that’s a coordination drill the climbers are basically stabilizing the litter the men above are doing the grunt work, the lifting.
While I like the idea of leave no man behind, I’ve just xperienced situations in which that option wasn’t practical.
Lastly, many of the men women and children we humped out just quit, fucking sat down quit. Was a time a person was in the back country they were well trained capable of the majority of self recovery.
Not a winter month goes by on Mt Shasta wherein the rescue teams are up recovering some fat slob or elderly retard ho use to be able to achieve the early morning hike times to summit and retreat in day light.
Lastly, I one worked with a AF helo pilot in Hood River Coumty, he was a reserve helo flyer. There is a very famous pic of him trying to set and drop PJ’s on the west side of Mt Hood.
Wind guest got the best of his Black Hawk and he crashed hard, it’s on film horrible crash, I was not there.
And sadly we lost a family friend Sunday at the Reno air Races. Nick Macy from Tulelake Calif either hit or was hit by the other plane in his torpedo plane. SIX CAT, he and another pilot I didn’t know both died.
While we are sad, I can’t help but think how lucky he was to die doing something he loved. We were told the race was over they were preparing to land when the crash happened. I do not know if that’s accurate.
Dirk
On September 20, 2023 at 3:26 pm, Herschel Smith said:
@Dirk,
But it was a solution to an imaginary problem. They only had their ego to worry about. “I spent this $$$, I want the pics to show my buddies that I did it.”
Whooo hooo! Ain’t I a stud!
No, you’re not. Not if you left a man behind to do it, you’re not. There was no war going on. There was no flood coming. No one else was perishing and in need of assistance.
It all had to do with ego.
On September 20, 2023 at 10:10 pm, Dirk Williams said:
What you would not know is my turf was the last NE county in Calif. a huge county. Every week I would be the only deputy on for hundreds of “ road miles”
I may have a Highway Patrolman somewhere we didn’t do the same comms. Ego? Yea, I was young dumb, and did what needed done. Ambulances. were often hours away, Hershel, , I really understand your point, and agree. I’ve sadly been in situations that simply weren’t ideal. And choices needed to be made. Those choices were poor to absolutely sucked.
Two key factors, we had fantastic training, and our K5 Blazers were well equipped, we could add what we thought would be useful.
Would I do thinks differently now. Yes, based on the options offered these das VS the late 80s. Early 90s.
Smile things, cell phones, Helo’s are now plentiful.
Like Aesop I’d like to hear the rest of the story. The guy was 62, just like to hear The Rest Of The Story.
Until I do,I’m fine with your position. Egos a killer.
Dirk
On September 20, 2023 at 10:15 pm, Herschel Smith said:
@Dirk,
“What you would not know is my turf was the last NE county in Calif. a huge county. Every week I would be the only deputy on for hundreds of “ road miles”
I get your situation.
But that’s not THEIR situation. Their situation was ego, and wanting to finish the trip. None of this applies to your situation.
On September 21, 2023 at 1:53 pm, TheAlaskan said:
This story just posted on Citizen Free Press. Prescient Captain.
On September 23, 2023 at 9:29 pm, snuffy said:
update. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/my-friends-did-everything-right-injured-grand-canyon-hiker-says-he-was-not-abandoned-on-trail/ar-AA1h4eY4#image=1