Words to the wise (and not so)

[Benny Profane]

Interesting article about 2 guys who died on Mt. Washington, and the sudden conditions that can kill any of us. Not the whole print article, but a good taste. A fascinating but simple concept that is the subject of research mentioned in the article is that we simply aren't prepared for the worse if we haven't experienced it. In other words, it seems to be a very dangerous thing to experience Washington on a nice sunny April day. It aint like that all the time. And can get bad real fast.

"Situated within a day's drive of 70 million people (a quarter of the nation's population), Mount Washington is what modern-day search and rescue volunteers call "instant wilderness." We come from the relatively safe environments of the city, where our mistakes are mostly forgiven, and we bring with us the careless ways we've learned there. Worse still, we travel to these danger zones and have a benign experience —like mine on Mount Washington on that beautiful sunny day. And that gives us a false sense of security."

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/ad...excerpt13.html

[Arnold Babar]

Yes, changing conditions claimed my right acl on the tall presidential mountain last spring. I would posit, though, that it is shear numbers that attribute the deadliness of the mountain. Not to mitigate the dangers there, but there are dangers everywhere. The reason more people don't die of Kimodo Dragon attacks, is because relatively few put themselves in proximity of Kimodo Dragons.