Dehydrated Hiker Rescued From Panamint Butte + Other Calls for Help

[DAW89446]

Death Valley Press Release: Dehydrated Hiker Rescued From Panamint Butte - Sierra Wave: Eastern Sierra News - The Communities News

[Beardilocks]

I'm copying this over from the Death Valley Hiking FB Page.  This is the story of the hiker Richard Mulligan from the Panamint Butte rescue the other day.  It's a good reminder to us all. 


This next journal entry is a cautionary tail. One that I’ve debated sharing out of feelings of embarrassment. However, I think it’s good, nay imperative, to show that even an experienced hiker can get themselves into trouble, and to show how important it is to be prepared for the worst.

I woke up at 3:30 AM and was out at 4:00 Am after grabbing some provisions and close to 9 liters of water. I began across the Panamint valley. My goal was to summit the Panamint Butte from the West face of the mountain range. This is one hike I’ve been researching since I’ve moved into the national park, one that I’ve discussed heavily with my friend (and DV expert) Chance. The west face is incredibly steep and would definitely be an all day scramble.

My first 8 miles to the base of the mountain were delightful. Around 75-80°, with the Perseid Meteor Shower providing a brilliant light show overhead. The peak of which was happening as I was beginning my hike. Meteorites exploding and streaking in the air in a stunning display of color delighted me as I put one foot in front of the other. About a mile in I noticed some eyes with my headlamp following me. As I brightened my headlamp I distinguished an adorable Kit Fox with the biggest ears, bigger than its head even. My canine companion sheepishly followed me across the valley floor for the next 4 or so miles until I reached Lake Hill, jumping in and out of cover slyly.

I followed the gravel road north after lake hill for another two or so miles after eating a snack or two. I reached the Big Four Mine, at which point I began my steep ascent. Steep is not a good enough descriptor for what I was about to do. For the next 5 hours I climbed on my hands and knees up a class 3/4 scramble, absolutely obliterating my hardly used arm and back muscles. It was incredibly slow going, around .75 miles per hour, and the sun began scorching overhead.

By noon I had finally reached the flat summit of the Butte to find the classic military ammo box with the logbook inside. This logbook was the original one from before the park received its national park status, dating back to 1978. There was so few names in the logbook, and even fewer who mentioned hiking it from the route that I took. I felt like I joined a select few psychos. I felt proud. I even had a little bit of signal to FaceTime my momma and talk for a bit. I checked the weather, even at 6,500 feet it was still 85°. I can only imagine what the valley floor or even Badwater Basin was at, significantly hotter, no doubt.

I consulted my topographical maps and decided that the canyon back down towards the valley floor was not incredibly steep. I started descending. Over the next few hours I ran out of my 20 pounds of water that I had brought, around 4:00 PM. I then reached an incredibly steep dryfall- around 30-40 feet maybe- with rappel points and anchors bolted in the wall. Not good. I did not have any rope or climbing equipment and decided that it would be much too risky to try and down climb in the event that I either fell, or came to something steeper. The topographical map had lied to me!

Seeing no other option I headed back up the incredibly steep canyon to down climb my previous ascent route, now waterless. More class 3 and class 4 scrambles up, very slow going, and I was starting to feel weaker and weaker, until eventually I completely lost consciousness, and began sliding down. I awoke to me about 20-30 feet lower than the last time I was conscious, with my head severely aching and against a big bolder. No blood, but it was clear I had hit my head. There was no telling how long I was unconscious for as I didn’t keep an eye on the time diligently, but it couldn’t have been for more than 5-10 minutes.

At this point I hit my SOS button on my Garmin InReach to get into contact with Search and Rescue to help me get out. I climbed up again to get to an easy evacuation point. By 7:00 PM I had reached the ridge and stayed put. My friends and trail family from the Colorado Trail had been following along, watching my back, and noticed I was no longer moving. Bus Stop and Banshee called SAR, as well as my job to alert the people closest to me of the situation.

I then sat there for 3/3.5 hours until a helicopter was able to pinpoint my exact coordinates that I gave them, and see my headlamp flashing in the darkness. Jesse “Petey” Peterson descended from the navy helicopter to check me out, and make sure that I was still alive. Luckily I was. He fitted me with a harness and connected me to the rope dangling from the helicopter. I was flung up into the air, where I was given some ice cold water, and hooked up to a machine to monitor my vitals.

We then B-lined it to the nearest hospital, Ridgecrest Regional Hospital, roughly 70 miles away. It was a really cool experience, aside from the grappling with my mortality. It was my first time in a helicopter ever. It hardly felt like we were moving, it was so level.
We got to the hospital around midnight, where they put me through a Cat Scan to check on my head- luckily no concussion. Afterwards they pumped me with 2L of IV fluids, and took my blood to run some tests. At around 3AM and after a door dash of del taco I was discharged to get back to Death Valley.

I was picked up by a mustang driven by JimBob, a delightful guy who relished conversation. By 4AM I was back on property to rest up on my second day off.

Please take heed of my story. I am an experienced hiker, and have lived in the park since November. This sort of thing could happen to absolutely anyone. If I did not have my Satellite Communicator, my headlamp, and friends who knew where I was supposed to be and when, I might not be alive to write this out. Please be prepared for the worst out there, and of course being way more water than you need.I want to extend an indebted thank you to the China Lake Search and Rescue squad for getting me out of this dicey situation safely. Along with that I want to thank Banshee and Bus Stop, and all the Panamint springs employees for realizing something was amiss.

[TacoLand]

Thanks for sharing that post. I feel like many of these bad experiences seem to involve trying to exit a hike/adventure via an unscouted route, versus the one traveled in on. I know I've done the same more than once, but so far have been lucky ...

One thing I can't wrap my head around is all the people we've been reading about putting themselves into dire straits by doing these hikes in July & August. As someone born and raised in the desert it goes against so much I consider to be common sense. It also doesn't hurt that forever in the back of my mind is the memory of the two horrible times I caught heatstroke as a youth.

Hope everyone is staying frosty out there.

[netllama]

Indeed, I have to question the judgement of anyone who chooses to hike this time of year in the park. Even at the highest elevations its not the best idea.

[MojaveGeek]

Thanks for the post, Beardilocks. I generally can't take the chatter on the FB regional hiking group pages so tune out. It is always useful to hear a first person account of a rescue situation.

The story begins nicely, but why trudge across the valley (I am guessing from PSR?) with that much water when you could drive to the place where the Big Four Mine road takes that 90 degree turn towards the mountains? Or, of you want to walk, maybe don't have a vehicle, get someone to take you there to leave a water cache?

That west side approach is awful but people do it. Way beyond my pay grade but... Coming down an unknown canyon based only on a read of topo maps is ill advised, unless you're really clear that you can back out. Just looking at the contour intervals is inadequate; not enough resolution. I use caltopo's "slope angle shading" which is based on a different set of higher precision data at high intervals and it is very useful. I was just out in the Sierra and there's many places where the topo suggests you can walk from A to B, but the slope angle shows a purple (very steep face) line blocking your way. But going down in heat with perhaps limited quantity of water...

If the author did the CDT they are seriously competent, but the wild desert poses different challenges from an established route that others have traveled. If the canyon is bolted, there is likely an entry on the rope wiki - always a good resource.

Anyway, good thing the author had what was needed to survive. Back before we had the sat comm tech, he may have been a goner. Sobering tale.

[Brice]

I did that climb last November.  It's moderately steep and there's a lot of scree which makes the going pretty slow on the way up and the way down.  I averaged less than 1.5 mph over the 6.5 mile roundtrip.

Even if he hadn't made the mistake of taking an unfamiliar gully down, I think he was already in a deadly situation while at the summit.  As he pointed out, it was 85 degrees and it took him 5 hours to make the climb (not including the valley crossing). I looked up the high temperature in Panamint springs that day; it was 105.  Best case scenario, he gets down to Lake hill road and if he's very lucky, someone is there to save him.  Otherwise he would have had to walk the 6 miles to HWY 190.  I doubt he would have made it.

I don't want to excoriate the guy too much because posting the story is valuable for others to read, but there's much about the post that makes me wonder if he even learned anything.  He chose to do something beyond his skill level, in scorching temperatures.  I reject his assertion that "this sort of thing could happen to absolutely anyone."

[MojaveGeek]

Brice makes excellent points, along with having first hand experience with the route, which I do not (I've wandered around the area around the Big Four some, but not gone much higher. I think Diconnet has a section on the area?). There is a pattern, of which I am guilty as much as others, to have a plan, goal, destination, story-in-advance for the day. And we get a bit fixated on that plan, in the process choosing to ignore clues that it may be unraveling. E.g., "I thought I'd summit by noon but it's still at least an hour away but no problem, I have plenty of daylight". That's often the case and indeed may be true, and is why I try to leave as early as possible But then "Gee I thought it would take me an hour more to get to the to and it's been two and I'm still not there and I'm not sure I have enough water, gee the sun is getting hot". Time to stop, eat that lunch, and head down? But we have summit fever and keep going. Could just end up being a long day, with headlamps on the way out. Done that. Or could be a rescue. So far, avoided that.

Of course the tension is that if you don't push yourself some times, you don't know your limits. I feel that a lot as I age and am less capable than I used to be, so it's a bit harder to judge based on prior experience. I know if I play it too safe, I'm giving in to age too quickly, and losing ability even faster. It can be a fine line between rising to a challenge and risky behavior, all amplified at least 10x when solo. (Of course, with a partner it can be more difficult to "chicken out" because as long as one wants to continue, the other will probably follow).

That also gets to the water question. Had he cached a liter or two at the mine, he would have been lighter / faster for the climb, and been insured of a good exit when he got back to the mine. But he would have run out sooner on the climb. Maybe that would have been a realistic motivator to turn back, which would have been the right thing to do, with hind sight.

Anyway, I do a lot of solo hiking and I try to think about these things. There certainly have been days when I've come back well into darkness saying to myself "I should not have done that. I exceeded my ability. I am lucky to be walking out" but at the same time "Yeah, that was a really cool summit, what a view". Tension.

[DAW89446]

Good points. My first caution flags was the fact that he chose to walk between PSR and the base of the mountain. That would have added at least four hours round trip to an already arduous hike; the last three miles of it uphill returning to PSR. Why not drive or have someone drop him off and pick him up?

[bbbb]

Good on him for posting his first person account. If anything, sharing the narrative allows people to look for the bad decisions the hiker made and apply the same logic to their own future trip plans, possibly saving someone else from a bad situation or having to get rescued.