How the untold trauma of Teton rescues extends beyond the injured

Pretty good article on pushing boundaries and the impact it's having on SAR, and written without being too preachy :

http://planetjh.com/2018/05/02/how-t...d-the-injured/

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“What is the bar now, and why does everybody need to get there?” she asked. When she first arrived in Jackson, something like the “Teton Picnic” would have been inconceivable. The triathlon includes biking from the Town Square to Jenny Lake, swimming across the lake, summiting the Grand Teton, and then doing it all in reverse. “What’s the top?” she asked. “Climbing the Grand in an hour? It’s changed the level of what you need to achieve in a day.”

Now, that level is incredibly high. Everyone feels they have to do The Trifecta, for example, but these runs aren’t static—they’re different every year due to changes in snowfall, temperature, wind and moisture.
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Originally Posted by sfotex

Pretty good article on pushing boundaries and the impact it's having on SAR, and written without being too preachy :

http://planetjh.com/2018/05/02/how-t...d-the-injured/

...............

“What is the bar now, and why does everybody need to get there?” she asked. When she first arrived in Jackson, something like the “Teton Picnic” would have been inconceivable. The triathlon includes biking from the Town Square to Jenny Lake, swimming across the lake, summiting the Grand Teton, and then doing it all in reverse. “What’s the top?” she asked. “Climbing the Grand in an hour? It’s changed the level of what you need to achieve in a day.”

Now, that level is incredibly high. Everyone feels they have to do The Trifecta, for example, but these runs aren’t static—they’re different every year due to changes in snowfall, temperature, wind and moisture.
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Our local NPR just did a story on a group here in CO that tries to get together all the survivors and people involved from these accidents and rescues and talk about the impact it has on them. Pretty similar take-aways. Our field manager has been on Mtn Rescue here for over 25 years and he would confirm pretty much everything in that article. Like old Bruce wrote, "there are no unconnected dots"

Well written
Not too preachy

But truth
Gnarly lines and hucking meat o.b. is different

Thanks for posting this.

Good article, reminds me of this one from Outside a while back. https://www.outsideonline.com/187021...o-saw-too-much

Good reminder for first responders its ok to ask for help when needed.

Good read. Sobering to think about the far reaching effects of our drive to get rad. Thank an SAR volly when you get a chance. They dont get paid for that shit. True heroes

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Should be mandatory reading.

Real impacts of what seems like a fantasy world of action sports all highs all the time. Consequences are real for the participants and the rescuers.

Go-go and go bigger culture is out of control. When the 2nd article mentions mongo has had 9 knee surgeries and umpteen other injuries over 30 years and I thought jeez that’s got to be pushing half of the time he’s been rehabbing. And then add all that death, gore, and heartbreak seen 1st hand, wow.

I def couldn’t handle that, I’d have been institutionalized years earlier.

Heroic


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I had a good scare a couple years ago with an avalanche, lucky to find the bed surface before taking a 1500ft ride down a narrow couloir. It was the first time I started thinking about what sort of impact my selfish action would have had on family, coworkers, friends, and teammates. I had thought about it a little at a memorials for ones lost doing what they love.

Your presence goes far beyond what you realize. At this memorial, the impact made on this world for one last time is lit up, like a nighttime photo from space. Everyone has these parts, pods, of their life where they have made connections, school mates, co-workers, that crazy summer you spent in a resort town, etc. You have touched a lot of lives and that should not be taken for granted.

Just listened to a pod cast related to the article
https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/...=1000402502860

What an incredibly thoughtful and well-written article.

Great article. Thanks for posting.

Great article and well stated. Take a SAR member out to lunch, or better yet, invest in your local SAR. or even better yet. if you have a skill set that can help.......look to join up.

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Originally Posted by new yabyum

invest in your local SAR. or better yet. if you have a skill set that can help.......look to join up.

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This ^^^ X100. Donations are fantastic, but participating is priceless. And at not all needs are for rescue operations. Admin, finance, building & asset mgmt are all roles that could use a hand.

Very well written. Thanks for sharing.

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Originally Posted by snowaddict91

Very well written. Thanks for sharing.

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+1 yeah

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Originally Posted by mall walker

+1 yeah

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sfotex bringin the goods
the mrs. says drews in her latest running mag
with kinda the same message
sure you can mega trail run unsupported and light but your self rescue/reliance factor is also light
so you're banking on additional poop fan blade support system
anyhow tell the skin and fur kids mom hi today
and thanks fer sarin
#innomexjeans

MRA in Aspen has had a rough go of things lately, from the back to back to back deaths on Capitol Peak to the avalanche death of one of their own this winter. I know a few mags are on there- hope you're all doing ok. Good article.

The well written article has several themes. I'll hit on two.

1. Mental Stress
There is a mental toll for rescuers and survivors. There was as an excellent series of 6 articles in the December 2017 issue of The Avalanche Review on this topic. If you aren't a TAR subscriber, become one so you can read it (also borrow a copy from an A3 member).

We are all human, nobody can predict how we will react, it is better to actively deal with problems including seeking help, and look out for your fellow peeps.
http://codegreencampaign.org/ is an excellent starting resource for first responders to get help.

SAR in the US is almost exclusively volunteer and is always seeking dedicated volunteers. If you bring a skillset and experience with you, all the better.

2. Problematic Mindset
We've had many discussions on this forum about the moral nature of risk taking, the true value of our pursuits, and responsibility vs adventure.

Reading about the themes on problematic mindset were:

1. Goal prioritization
2. Regional cultural imperative to push the limits
3. Group culture of discussing risk ultimately as a formality without ability to change course.

That's the reason for the focus on human factors in mountain/avalanche education over the last 15 years. I always warn students, "There is nothing more powerful that the human minds ability to convince itself that what it wants to do is actually the right thing to do." The only intervention is a semi-formal set of tools to counter this very natural human tendency. An example would be a combination of:

1. Enthusiastically embraced all-to-go one-to-say-no group mindset combined with acceptance of philosophical aphorisms like "there is a right day for every line, it might not be today, but the line will always be there" and "no line is worth getting hurt on"
2. Checklist like mnemonic like FACCCETS to check for unacknowledged human factor traps in play
3. Group habit of using 2 to achieve 1

This is meant to be an alternative to dialing back risk after near death experience(s) as the fellow in the article did.

D. Social Stigma
One other mindset theme was negative social stigma earned by revealing being a slide. According to the avalanche survivor in the article, that is the culture of his community. 10 years ago this was a global problem in the backcountry world (and I was part of it). But in recent years, at least in my area and on this forum, but also in education and media, there has been a strong effort to lower accident stigma in the hopes of encouraging openness to aid learning and helping others learn from error. Respected community figures have to be change leaders in setting the tone of such discussions, often best done by self-disclosure.

The rise in seeking GNAR has grown since the mainstreamness of the GoPro and now the drone. Coupled with the quick rise of the iPhone and apps like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Strava everyone wants to race, post pics, post video and out-do the bro next door.

At the same time, I know that skiing has slowed down in the GNAR factor. They reached peak at the pro level a few years back, but that's not stopping the social media ladder climbers below them.

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Originally Posted by skifishbum

sfotex bringin the goods
the mrs. says drews in her latest running mag
with kinda the same message
sure you can mega trail run unsupported and light but your self rescue/reliance factor is also light
so you're banking on additional poop fan blade support system

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This article?:
https://trailrunnermag.com/people/cu...-business.html

Not mentioned in the article is a local runner who died in a fall in Bell's Canyon:
https://www.deseretnews.com/article/...-accident.html

Another article in a similar vein that was published last week:

"A few weeks after the accident, Doro was scrolling through Facebook and came across a post about Capitol Peak that tagged a news article about Lord’s accident. “Hardest peak ever,” the post read. “So many people have died, but I crushed this mountain.”

https://www.hcn.org/issues/50.8/recr...-in-the-alpine

It was cool !

We have the cushion of knowing help is relatively close at hand most of the time now in USA. A cell phone or spot locator can send a message out and rescue by helicopter or other means is not far off. Mentally this makes us feel safer and the risks taken are bigger.

A huge thanks to all who put in the long hours for SAR. It is hard and dangerous work.

Rule number 1 for me is don't get hurt so you can ski the next day. I really like the challenges the BC has, but I am much more measured in how I approach them.

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Originally Posted by BCMountainHound

This ^^^ X100. Donations are fantastic, but participating is priceless. And at not all needs are for rescue operations. Admin, finance, building & asset mgmt are all roles that could use a hand.

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This. If you have any ability, sign up. SAR ops take hours so even if you can’t get there until after work, etc. your assistance will be appreciated. I’ve never been on a rescue call when we had too much manpower.

Many, many, opportunities, great folks at all levels. It becomes a community project.