Re: Denali: Injured Hiker Attracts Rescuers With Wildfire

Denali National Park & Preserve (AK)
Injured Hiker Attracts Rescuers With Wildfire

During the late afternoon hours of September 5th, the park’s dispatch center received a report of a fire in the Sanctuary River drainage about 10 miles south of the park road. Coincidentally, the park's contract helicopter was in the air at the time, extracting backcountry rangers from a moose-hunting patrol on the park's north boundary. Rangers Dan Fangen-Gritis and Matt Smith diverted the ship to the reported fire location. Smoke from the fire was readily visible. As the helicopter descended for a landing, the rangers saw a man on the ground waving at them with one arm. They contacted Robert Faber, a 39-year-old resident of Toronto, Canada. Faber had taken a 20-foot fall the previous evening, lost most of his equipment, and sustained fractures to his upper arm and lower spine. He continued hiking out about 10 miles, but failed to attract attention from passing airplanes. As his strength and condition deteriorated, he started a fire on a bench of dwarf birch above the river. Faber was stabilized and evacuated and subsequently transported by air ambulance to Fairbanks. Members of the park's fire management team controlled the four-acre fire with about 40 water bucket drops. Ranger Jaime Smith was the incident commander.

I can't understand anyone hiking any distances in Alaska alone. The wilderness there is just inconceivable to people in the lower 48.

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan

Mr. Furter; In looking over the general discussions, you seem to be quite opinionated. I as an Alaskan have hiked over 3,000 miles in the backcountry, without trails, from glaciers to bushwacking, to river crossings and ridges. I have done so alone, and understand your concern, but a person cannot always live over a safety net; to do so is not always real living. We build cabins alone, split wood alone, and last out the dark winters alone. Hiking is the easy part.

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JJK101
I as an Alaskan have hiked over 3,000 miles in the backcountry, without trails, from glaciers to bushwacking, to river crossings and ridges.

Got any photos? How about some trip reports?

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan

Why are you asking?

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JJK101
Why are you asking?

Because he'd like to hear about your adventures.

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eeek

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JJK101
Why are you asking?

Because he'd like to hear about your adventures.

This General Discussion part of the website is available to exchange information, trip reports, etc. about non-Sierra adventures as well as an open-ended plethora of other topics.

Some of the other locales which have been discussed have been the Cascades, the Grand Canyon, Zion, Bryce, Glacier, and Yellowstone. (Dr. Furter lives in MT and has provided several reports on the latter two destinations as well as on his Sierra trips.) Most of these threads are actually located over on this website's Yosemite/Sierra forum since this Gen. Disc. forum has only been fairly recently established and the older threads have generally not been migrated over here.

Offhand, I can not recall any Alaskan input to this website previous to yours... hence the interest.

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JJK101
Why are you asking?

As per eeek and szalkowski. Thousands of miles in Alaska hiking alone is an extraordinary accomplishment!
For me, solo adventures have yielded some of my most memorable experiences.

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan

A method for a solo hiker to have companionship on the trail:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jMaPs8Sy62eWpwiEhgMYNn7av0SwD9B90EGO0

Maine couple wins wife-carrying championship
NEWRY, Maine — A Maine couple has taken the crown in the North American Wife Carrying Championship over a course that featured a muddy water hole and two log obstacles......

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The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.
-- Carl Sagan



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/11/2009 07:17PM by Frank Furter.

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Frank Furter
wife-carrying

You shouldn't be giving them ideas!

Right up there with lobster boat races.

Jim