+- Death Valley (https://dv.netllama.us/dv)
+-- Forum: Death Valley (https://dv.netllama.us/dv/forum-1.html)
+--- Forum: Western Places (https://dv.netllama.us/dv/forum-8.html)
+--- Thread: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras (/thread-25836.html)
Pages:
1
2
Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - Candace66 - 2021-02-06
I'll just drop this off without comment...
Article link
Man spends seven days stranded after his GPS directed him to an unplowed mountain pass
By Cheri Mossburg and Jessica Myers, CNN
Updated 8:53 PM ET, Fri February 5, 2021
![[Image: 210205201657-snow-rescue-gps-bad-directi...ge-169.jpg]](https://cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/210205201657-snow-rescue-gps-bad-directions-exlarge-169.jpg)
Harland Earls waves to a California Highway Patrol helicopter on Sunday, January 31. Earls was stranded for seven days in the Sierra Nevada mountains.
(CNN)A man who became stranded during heavy snow in the backcountry of California's Sierra Nevada mountains for a week after following the directions on his GPS was rescued alive after surviving on a small supply of food and melted snow.
Harland Earls, 29, was traveling from Grass Valley to Truckee for a birthday party on January 24, a drive that would typically take less than two hours, when a heavy snowstorm shut down Interstate 80. Seeking an alternate route, Earls turned to his GPS, according to the Sierra County Sheriff's Office.
The device directed Earls to the shortest route on the map. But the GPS didn't account for Henness Pass Road being an unplowed mountain pass and Earls ended up being stuck for days in snow so deep he was unable turn his vehicle around, the sheriff's office said.
"The GPS doesn't know if there's six feet of snow on a road or if the road is clear and passable," Sierra County Sheriff Mike Fisher told CNN.
Stuck and unable to obtain a cell phone signal, Earls tried tying small branches to the tires of his pickup truck to gain some traction, his mother, Julie Earls told CNN. In the process, his cell phone got wet and stopped working. The resourceful man found some dry spaghetti noodles and handwarmer packets in his truck, and popped them into a Ziploc bag with his phone. It took three days, but the phone finally dried out enough to for him to charge it and make a call. But finding cell service wasn't as easy.
While Earls survived on two cans of beans, some sausages and a few pieces of stale, moldy bread, the man's family reported him missing and assembled search parties to hunt for him. Law enforcement was alerted and various agencies were on the lookout for Earls and his pickup truck.
The sheriff's office said that Earls' pickup truck had a camper that provided some shelter and he had winter clothing and some propane for a camp stove.
In the meantime, another storm moved through the region, dumping even more snow, his mother said
Yet she wasn't about to give up on finding her son.
"I will not wait until spring to find his body. I will find him now if I have to go out there myself," Julie Earls said, noting that her son had always been interested in survival skills and that as a boy, she would often find him reading a survival skills book with a flashlight in the middle of the night.
Earls was able to cut wood for a fire, and used a small propane camp stove to melt snow into drinking water, which he drank out of a small dog dish. He tried hiking out a few times, but couldn't make it far enough to find a cell phone signal as he kept sinking into the deep snow. He had now been stuck for seven days
"And then on Sunday (January 31), he really was desperate and he was out of provisions and ... his phone was finally charging up to at least 50%," his mother said. "So it gave him the chance to hike up to the highest point."
Earls strapped two snowboards to his feet to use as makeshift snowshoes to hike to a place where he could get cell service. The connection was bad and the call quickly dropped, but it lasted long enough for him to give the 911 operator his name and birth date.
Law enforcement was able to pinpoint the GPS location of his phone and launched ground search and rescue teams as well as a helicopter. After scouring the area, the California Highway Patrol helicopter crew located him "almost immediately," Fisher said.
His mother said Earls declined any medical attention once he was rescued.
"He just wanted to get home. He was hungry, cold and tired, very weary as I met him at the sheriff's station," she said.
Earls is physically doing well, his mother said.
"I've been feeding him all of his favorite foods and vitamins and rehydrating," she said. "He drank probably a gallon of water the first day that he got here."
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - MojaveGeek - 2021-02-06
Good ending. Might easily not have been.
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - TacoLand - 2021-02-06
I live near one end of Henness Pass Road and it is blanketed with signs that say things like "Road Not Maintained" and "Reliance on G.P.S. Not Advised" and "DO NOT USE IN WINTER" .... and yet every ... single ... year .... people just plow right by those signs and into the deep snow until they get stuck.
Here's one photo of a sign 1/2 mile before you get to the start of the Pass. Last time I went to the trailhead there were at least another 3 signs related to not using the road in winter.
Sigh.
![[Image: C16lFWDUsAEIew6.jpg]](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C16lFWDUsAEIew6.jpg)
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - MojaveGeek - 2021-02-06
Wow, that hi-vis warning sign is pretty explicit, isn't it!
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - netllama - 2021-02-06
Most people are idiots.
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - trailhound - 2021-02-07
I seem to remember a couple of cases in Oregon where people blindly followed GPS directions onto unmaintained logging roads in the middle of winter. There was a terrible case where a single mom and her young son were driving from Las Vegas to the Thorndike campground in summer. She followed the GPS to Baker and turned off onto Hwy 127. The GPS put her on the dirt road leading to the abandoned telephone relay tower. It took her past the tower and across the desert. Her vehicle became stuck. It was several days before a routine ranger patrol spotted her tire tracks and investigated. Unfortunately, her son died of exposure. The rangers moved her car by putting the floor mats under the drive wheels. An article stated that DV officials were working with GPS makers to remove these old mining roads from their units.
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - Candace66 - 2021-02-08
(2021-02-07, 12:14 PM)trailhound Wrote: ... There was a terrible case where a single mom and her young son were driving from Las Vegas to the Thorndike campground in summer. She followed the GPS to Baker and turned off onto Hwy 127. The GPS put her on the dirt road leading to the abandoned telephone relay tower. It took her past the tower and across the desert. Her vehicle became stuck. It was several days before a routine ranger patrol spotted her tire tracks and investigated. Unfortunately, her son died of exposure. The rangers moved her car by putting the floor mats under the drive wheels. An article stated that DV officials were working with GPS makers to remove these old mining roads from their units.
I think you are referring this 2009 incident involving Alicia Sanchez. Below is the full statement from the NPS about it:
NPS statement
While looking for articles about that incident, I came across some about a 2016 fatality I don't remember hearing of. But I think I'll make a separate thread for that.
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - MojaveGeek - 2021-02-08
Right. One thing that always bothered me about that incident was that she got a flat, and then went on with no spare. And (fortunately I guess) abandoned the flat. Saved her life. But not her son's. Very very sad.
Sometimes when I'm out there I encounter people who figured I look dirty enough to maybe know my way around. If they ask me about some road that I know is remote but passable with a sedan, I ask how much water they have. Their response strongly colors how I answer that.
On a funnier note, I once got a good chewing out from a ranger at the SPW station when I walked in with my daughter, maybe 6 or 7 years?, and asked about the condition of the Big Pine Rd. All I wanted to know was whether there was any new washout or anything, as I'd heard there was some issue with the Racetrack road. Well, she told me it was totally irresponsible to take a child on that route and if I wanted to go to the Eureka Dunes (I didn't) I should drive the long way around on pavement.
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - Sparky of SoCal - 2021-02-09
All being said it appears the GPS units all involved did exactly I would hope a GPS unit would do.
RE: Man narrowly escapes death-by-GPS in the Sierras - David_Bricker - 2021-02-09
I taught my son Noah, when he worked at PSR, and people asked for directions to someplace remote: "What are you driving, and what provisions do you have?". He then took the conversation from there, depending on the answer. You can't imagine the number of people I've encountered at PSR, asking for directions to the Racetrack, or the springs, driving a conventional car, with a liter of water between two people. Suddenly, in my mind, all roads there just became impassible.
Unfortunately, I have pretty much given up on most NPS personnel for road conditions. Only once, one of them asked me what I was driving, and I pointed to my XJ. He got kind of quiet, and said "you'll have no issue".
David Bricker / SYR