Hikers Survive Frigid Night on Mt Washington

[MichaelJ]

These folks are very lucky.

Two Massachusetts hikers lost the trail in a whiteout on Mount Washington and were forced to spend a frigid night outside.

Fish and Game say 51-year-old Daniel Molloy of East Sandwich and 31-year-old Nilton Motta of Plymouth had planned a day hike to the summit on Sunday. By 4 p.m., they were caught in a whiteout above treeline.

Eventually, they dug a deep hole in the snow, insulating themselves with extra gear. At dawn Monday, they got their bearings and hiked off the mountain as searchers began looking for them.

Full Boston.com article

 

[riverc0il]

Probably a smart call to dig in and wait out the conditions. Sucks S&R had to get called out to search when they walked out on their own. I am sure S&R was happy to be hiking back out without a litter.

 

[MichaelJ]

Absolutely. And I shouldn't just say they were very lucky - they did some smart things and were prepared to be out there. I don't want to discount that.

 

[Mike P.]

Sounds like the gear & what to do in case they got lost was well thought out. If i was going to say anything that might ne negative it has to do with the closing comments.

Unexpected snowstorms on Mt. Washington (& the rest of the Presidentials, Moosilauke & the Higher Franconia peaks) happen often enough so they should not be unexpected, the Washington storms are particular well documented.

Considering the extra clothing they had & the smarts to dig in & get comfortable, I would say they did expect those conditions or had a plan for them. To really not expect it they wouldn't have done the right things & would have required a litter or worse.

Is this up in on the Fish & Game site yet? would be curious about more details like what trails they had planned on using & where did they end up when they dug the hole. They didi not summit

 

[Mike P.]

There was more info in the Union Leader Article. They had parked at the Cog so Ammo or Jewell was their expected route. Does not sound like they made it to the top as the pot used to dig the hole was intended to be used at the top, not was used at the top.

While I think an approach from the Cog is easier than the PNVC trailheads, the caveat is that you are above treeline for more miles & the area above LOC, is somewhat featureless, (non-prominent features) especially in low/poor visibility conditions. Weather does come in from that side but on a gray day with 200-300 visibility which would make seeing Cairns okay, it would be hard to see if the gray low light low visibility conditions coming at you were more gray & worse then the gray you were in.

Coming in from the Cog on a weekend I would not expect you to be alone but it's far from the Conga line that can be in place on the standard Winter Lion's head Route. On Lion's head if you found that others were turning back, you might follow the tribe or at least really think about it.

This had a happy ending so that's good, also shows you need probably fair or better weather to try this approach.

 

[Bergamo]

Another article:

http://ledger.southofboston.com/articles/2008/02/07/news/news01.txt