HikeArizona.COM

LAKE MONTEZUMA, AZ -- Four hikers were found Monday after getting stranded near Wet Beaver Creek in Northern Arizona over the weekend.

Officials with the Yavapai County Sheriff's Office said they received a report of four overdue hikers in the Waldroup Canyon, Wet Beaver Creek wilderness area on Sunday morning.

The man reporting the missing hikers, whose son was one of those missing, said the group arrived at the area on Friday morning and were expected back on Saturday evening.

YCSO said the four hikers, identified as 28-year-old Steven Smith and his 21-year-old wife Megan Smith of Glendale, and their friends, 27-year-old Jeremy Borie and his 24-year-old wife Alana Borie of Phoenix, were reportedly experienced hikers and climbers.

The group had camping gear on hand as well as food and other supplies and was prepared to spend the night if necessary.

Forest patrol deputies said they were able to locate a vehicle belonging the group parked in a trailhead area.

But due to the ages of the hikers, and their reported preparedness for the hike, rescue operations were delayed until Monday morning. Deputies were assisted with aerial search operations by Arizona Department of Public Safety Air Rescue.

YCSO officials said the group was found a little after 10 a.m. on Monday and flown to safety.

The hikers reported that they had not expected the extreme rock climbing and boulder hopping conditions, not to mention the number of deep pools that required swimming and flotation of gear. (OK - so you have and have read SOME of the guidebook, but chose to ignore the MANY DEEP POOLS, and "lots of swimming" parts?)

They told officials a 'canyoneering' guide indicated the hike could be completed in about 16 hours, but rescue personnel said the hike should be allowed at least two to three days to complete.

I believe that the 'guidebook' says "TIME NEEDED: This loophike is about 35km but it's hot and dry on the
mesa top, then lots of swimming back down in the canyon.. Strong fast (well, i guess that they will never consider themselves THAT) hikers can do it in 2 days, but 3 days may be best for some.
MAIN ATTRACTIONS: .... MANY DEEP SWIMMING POOLS

AUTHOR'S EXPERIENCE: With an early morning start he went up the Apache Maid Trail #15, but had to explore in the heat of the day to reach Waldroup Place. Then into the canyon and out the bottom in 2 FULL DAYS with a total walk time of 16 HOURS.



Well.... at least they are publishing their names, so we'll beware.

I'd like to hear what their "experience" consisted of. Have they really done something comparable? What made them think they could do 35km on that terrain as a dayhike when the days are getting short?

big_load wrote:I'd like to hear what their "experience" consisted of. Have they really done something comparable? What made them think they could do 35km on that terrain as a dayhike when the days are getting short?

I would hazard a guess that it consisted of casual hiking and playing around in a rock gym. That seems to be the standard "qualification." Someone should make these people watch that I Shouldn't Be Alive episode Nightmare Canyon before embarking on these fools' errands.

or could it simply be that like most Americans, the individuals involved are metric impaired?

A Boy Scout Varsity Team in 1988 made the same mistake by reading about this trip in a hiking book written and published by one of those experienced fast canyon hikers. The DPS plucked them out four days later still eight miles short of the south trail head. On the second pickup one of the pilots turned around and said to one of the boys, "Haven't I seen you before?'" The boy answered, "Yes, you are the same guys that picked us up last year!"

One of my Scouts who had done a five day backpack trip with me in the Superstitions the year before had joined this group and told me when he returned that he knew they were in trouble when he met them at the church parking lot as one of the leaders was carrying a cooler!

SuperstitionGuy wrote:one of the leaders was carrying a cooler

Yep, that's a dead give-away of a "psuedo-hiker" (copyright 2009 by HPP)

hippiepunkpirate wrote:Yep, that's a dead give-away of a "psuedo-hiker" (copyright 2009 by HPP)

Good call in copyrighting that one. I bring coolers backpacking. Leave it in the truck and just keep some cold brews in there for enjoyment when you return. Of course, hopefully the Boy Scout leader wasn't doing that, either... plz:

No, he intended to carry it all the way but I suspect that this cooler never made it out of the canyon. The airlift the previous year was because they were in a car accident somewhere out in a remote area of an Indian Reservation and the DPS pilots flew them all out because of the remoteness of the area they were in.

You see super-campers hauling coolers into Sabino Canyon all the time, too. All I can do is.. :roll:

hippiepunkpirate wrote:

SuperstitionGuy wrote:one of the leaders was carrying a cooler

Yep, that's a dead give-away of a "psuedo-hiker" (copyright 2009 by HPP)

You can have that copyright, I'm gonna copyright the version spelled correctly!

nonot wrote:

hippiepunkpirate wrote:

SuperstitionGuy wrote:one of the leaders was carrying a cooler

Yep, that's a dead give-away of a "psuedo-hiker" (copyright 2009 by HPP)

You can have that copyright, I'm gonna copyright the version spelled correctly!

Ha! Good catch.

I'm curious how they were "flown to safety". Just spotting someone down in that canyon from the air would be tough, let alone getting a chopper down in there. Doubt there's any easy way to climb up to the rim from mid-canyon either. Maybe they had reversed course back up Waldroup and were on the mesa?

toddak wrote:I'm curious how they were "flown to safety". Just spotting someone down in that canyon from the air would be tough, let alone getting a chopper down in there. Doubt there's any easy way to climb up to the rim from mid-canyon either. Maybe they had reversed course back up Waldroup and were on the mesa?

If that was the case, couldn't they have just hiked back?

toddak wrote:I'm curious how they were "flown to safety". Just spotting someone down in that canyon from the air would be tough, let alone getting a chopper down in there. Doubt there's any easy way to climb up to the rim from mid-canyon either. Maybe they had reversed course back up Waldroup and were on the mesa?

Probably a basket lift or short-haul of some kind.

man , wet beaver creek this time of year without a drysuit, they would have died of hypothermia , what knot heads.

I understand that these morons had a dog (Daisy) with them and were located well up Beaver Creek Canyon and, by estimation of the helicopter crew, "were probably one to two days out from making the Bell Trailhead parking area where their vehicle was staged."
Being slow (and not too swift above the ears either) is not an injury; I would lobby for the DPS crew to pick up the dog, drop off 2 days of food to the 4 and be done with it.

Never say never Kurt, after all if being fat is a disability, stupidity is not far behind from some lawyer arguing in court that being a dimwit is a physical handicap.

I'm waiting for the day our former and current presidents qualify under that new definition

They probably had some guys rappel down and cut the trees down.

http://www.math.utah.edu/~sfolias/canyo ... i=parallel

nonot wrote:They probably had some guys rappel down and cut the trees down.

http://www.math.utah.edu/~sfolias/canyo ... i=parallel

Loved this story nonot. Just think of how many more similar situations never get printed. By the way that quote of 8 miles upstream was from the boy and he was probably just guessing how far they traveled in that helicopter after they got picked up. I.E. his guess was probably off by 50 percent. I have no idea how or where the chopper landed to pick them up.

nonot wrote:They probably had some guys rappel down and cut the trees down.

http://www.math.utah.edu/~sfolias/canyo ... i=parallel

Good read...it's just retarded how many people overestimate their competency and back country skills, and underestimate how gnarly the terrain can be in Arizona.

I'll go ahead and be the jerk that argues they should have tried to lift her and left the trees alone.