San Gabriel Mountains & Beyond
https://eispiraten.com/
Overzealous response? Or is 10 normal?San Bernardino County Sheriff's Air Rescue pulled two missing hikers and 10 rescuers to safety today from Sugar Loaf Peak near Mount Baldy.
A guy named Tyler wrote this in the comments section of the PE story:Hikin_Jim wrote:Anyone know what lead up to the rescue?
This seems to jive with the marked up map provided by SBSAR. Sounds like they got to Sugarloaf then tried to do a blind descent down a drainage to the parking lot but got blocked by brush.We were not lost or missing, i cross countried DOWNHILL toward the parking lot and hit a dead end at night fall, my hiking partner was exhausted and hiking up the scree would be extreamly dangerous.
also we where not on the peak we where 1000 ft. below it on the north side, i could see the parking lot just couldnt get to it..
to go back up would mean 1000+ ft. of gain on a very steep rock scree slope at night. i was content to stay the night, the reason we were labeled missing was cause my partners parnets was concerend and called the sherriffs. it took the search and rescue guys 6 hours to get through a relitivly short area to us but the buck thorn bush was extreamly dense, tall, thick, and painfull along the steep rock slope, i felt really bad for them as i heard them struggling through it. i didnt want them to come, just lower the helicopter and get us out. they got to us at 4 30 am and chilled with us, they where really cool funny guys who do it cause they love to do it.
Lol the person i went with knew we where gonna cross counrty out, rather than taking a proven route we wanted to take a gamble and beat sun down, oh well, we stayed the night rather comfortably and didnt wish for any ground crews to attempt reaching us, i knew it would be dangerous for them, i planned on finding a way out come day break, not in the dark. my partner was exhausted so we found a good spot to stay in theopen and have a contained fire for warmth. her parents called the sheriffs around 10 pm and they sent a chopper, while a forest ranger saw my light and radioed the chopper, they could have just grabbed us and not sent a crew, it wasnt my choice. but we had a fun time with the SAR members and they where stoked they didnt have to do the annual baldy run. one of them was so fricken happy he thanked me when we left cause it was the first time he got to be air lifted out after lots of near misses where they told him to hike out. He had a smile ear to ear.
I gotta wonder, though: why the helicopter evac? Helicopters are dangerous. The risk of injury or death is probably greater taking the helicopter ride than hiking back out.mattmaxon wrote: I personally know 5-6 members of the SB Cave Rescue team and respect their judgment