The Pacific Coast Ski Resorts are over load with snow now. Last night I came in and just picked up on the end of a NEWS story regarding a family becoming lost while cross country skiing. The mother and children had been found by a rescue team, but they were still searching for the father.
Recently a New Yorker had to be rescued off of the 14,162 tall Mt. Shasta in Northern California. He held up in a blizzard over night 500 yards from a Hut. The rescue team was spending the night in the Hut. The Hut is located at Horse Camp and is shown on many maps. It would not be hard in planning a trip on Shasta to pre-load a waypoint in a gps for the Hut. But then again it is not very wise to climb Shasta in the winter. The tall mountain generates it's own weather.
Not meaning to pick on New Yorkers, but I believe they might make more headlines because they are well travelled. A few years ago a group of them skiing Squaw Valley went out-of-bounds and dropped into the wilderness area. They ended up in the Five Lakes drainage. The snow load in the area is very heavy. The ground is steep, and if you follow Five Lakes Creek downhill it flows into Hell Holes Res. Hell Holes is not called Hell Hole without a reason. One of the victims was later found drown in a stream. And it cost taxpayers thousands of dollars to search for these lost skiers. The loss of life was unfortunate, but can lessons be learned from this.
The first lesson would be to stay in-bounds. But I have been in the High Sierra's during a blizzard. The winds are blowing snow up 100 miles per hour. You can no longer see land marks. When the wind quits blowing the clouds set down on the mountain. Every thing is white, and locked down with gray clouds. You have held out under the low limbs of a conifer, you know that the helicopters cannot fly in the clouds. You are not sure what direction to go. If you go the wrong direction you can end up behind Hell Hole, or some other roadless canyon.
Clearly the time for planning is before you leave home. I am sure the same story is repeated in New Hampshire, Colorado, and Taos every year. A small gps and compass can make the difference.
