Globe story on a winter ski trip from Zealand to the Kanc gone bad

[DougPaul]

Glad I could count on your affrimation on this one Doug and especially the expanded rhetoric.

Great minds run in the same gutters...
And the expanded rhetoric is just a guess at some possible factors.

The bottom line of the Globe's article says it all.

The final line of the article is: "But he would set a point of no return and learn more about trail conditions. 'And probably take another trail.'" This is nice and easy to say after the fact (makes one sound all knowing...), but realistically one rarely has completely reliable info on the trail conditions and thus one must make (hopefully educated) guesses. On all of my trips in there, I have made the assumption that I might not be able to complete the plan and might have to turn back or go for an escape route.

The article states that their water bottles froze and they only had one energy bar each to eat. If this is accurate, it tells me that they were most likely woefully under prepared for a long BC ski. As it turned out, they were pretty slow and ran out of both food and water. In contrast on the 2011 lollipop, Becca and I brought extra food and water and simply assumed from the start that we would have to ski into or through the night. (We were out for ~28 hrs... * We did run out of water, but replenished at an open stream crossing.) Sure, the traverse may have been done in ~10hrs, but it would be dangerous to assume that one will be able to move that fast.

* I had done the lollipop in 18 hours in 2003 (9am to 3am the next morning) and we were guessing that it would probably take us more like 20 hours. Unexpected route finding difficulties slowed us down, but we had enough margin to deal with it.

Doug

 

[skiguy]

Great minds run in the same gutters...
And the expanded rhetoric is just a guess at some possible factors.Doug

Speak for yourself. My mind is not even close to great and certainly not in the gutter. Also "Hypothesizing" makes it sound more like you might know what your talking about than "guessing".

The final line of the article is: "But he would set a point of no return and learn more about trail conditions. 'And probably take another trail.'" This is nice and easy to say after the fact (makes one sound all knowing...), but realistically one rarely has completely reliable info on the trail conditions and thus one must make (hopefully educated) guesses. On all of my trips in there, I have made the assumption that I might not be able to complete the plan and might have to turn back or go for an escape route.Doug

Exactly!

 

[dclynch]

When I read the article, I thought the problem was that they were skiing. If a group of six fit people were on snowshoes, it does not seem the obstacles encountered would be that tough. I winter hike and can easily imagine breaking through the conditions they encountered with five strong friends.

Thoughts?

 

[Becca M]

Yeah, i think it would have been easier for their group on snowshoes!!! I was in there a week later on skis - the light tracks I saw might have been theirs (I did not complete a traverse... but, went out and back on the East Side Trail twice - once on Thoreau Falls Trail a little ways).

Not clear what they had for navigation - DougPaul downloaded the trails on his gps for our 2011 trip - I doubt they had that info. Clearly they did not have enough food/water/clothing/provisions for the night out.

 

[DougPaul]

When I read the article, I thought the problem was that they were skiing. If a group of six fit people were on snowshoes, it does not seem the obstacles encountered would be that tough. I winter hike and can easily imagine breaking through the conditions they encountered with five strong friends.

Thoughts?

Yeah, i think it would have been easier for their group on snowshoes!!! I was in there a week later on skis - the light tracks I saw might have been theirs (I did not complete a traverse... but, went out and back on the East Side Trail twice - once on Thoreau Falls Trail a little ways).

IMO, it depends on the snow conditions. If their skis were staying on or near the surface, skis would have been easier--skis pack a much narrower track than snowshoes and thus much less work is required to break trail. (The distance that you sink in depends primarily on the waist width of the skis, your weight, and, of course, the snow.) However, modern skis can submarine (go under) in deep light powder (older skis often had a much more upturned shovel to prevent this). If this was happening, forward progress would have been miserable--snowshoes would have been easier under these conditions (but still a lot of work).

I haven't seen any reports describing their skis--narrow track skis have a lot less flotation than wider BC skis.

As another datapoint, when I did the solo lollipop in 2003, I full broke about 8mi and "half-broke" (over one set of snowshoe tracks) about another 8mi. Snow conditions were very good: 4-6in of fresh powder over a hard crust. Breaking only slowed me down a little bit.

I recall that there was deep powder the weekend that this group went out. One week after that, there was a light rain and on the second weekend after (when we went), conditions were a breakable crust with ~3in of fresh on top at the EPT tapering down to essentially no fresh by somewhere near the junction between the WT and TFT. (We were watching the snow conditions to decide when to do our traverse.)

So it is possible that the snow was too deep and soft for efficient skiing (particularly if they were using track skis).

Not clear what they had for navigation - DougPaul downloaded the trails on his gps for our 2011 trip - I doubt they had that info.

When I did it two weeks later (2014), the entire route (except perhaps for one spot*) was easily found by following the trail corridor in the trees. (Clearly, a lot of maintenance had been done since 2011.) No GPS needed.
* When Becca and I did the SPT in 2011, we went up the bluff just S of the crossing at Stillwater and (after significant trailfinding difficulty in the dark) found where the trail drops down off the bluff to a ledge along the river. In 2014, we skied on the river around the bluff and climbed the bank to the ledge at the point where the trail drops down from above. If there were no tracks to follow and no one from the group had been there before, then they might have had some difficulty at this spot.

Doug

 

[B the Hiker]

I do just want to point out that just because someone successfully completes a trip, that doesn't mean it was safe.

I should also note that just because someone did a trip on a given weekend, it was appropriate for someone else to try it under different conditions.

But perhaps those are conversations for another day.

Brian

 

[Mike P.]

I do just want to point out that just because someone successfully completes a trip, that doesn't mean it was safe.

I should also note that just because someone did a trip on a given weekend, it was appropriate for someone else to try it under different conditions.

But perhaps those are conversations for another day.

Brian

And in the same thought, even if you did the trip annually, besides the snow conditions, trail conditions, weather..., your condition can change too. We're all getting older, or may even just a couple of bad night's sleeping this time before your trip has you dragging. (Worst yet, if someone else in the party is dragging & doesn't tell you until it's apparent 1/2 way through when you had planned on everyone being stronger/faster.)

Why it's good to build in a safety cushion on the all trips, but especially the harder winter ones. (extra gear, food, water & time)

 

[skiguy]

And in the same thought, even if you did the trip annually, besides the snow conditions, trail conditions, weather..., your condition can change too. We're all getting older, or may even just a couple of bad night's sleeping this time before your trip has you dragging. (Worst yet, if someone else in the party is dragging & doesn't tell you until it's apparent 1/2 way through when you had planned on everyone being stronger/faster.)

Why it's good to build in a safety cushion on the all trips, but especially the harder winter ones. (extra gear, food, water & time)

This is an excellent point Mike. This is the type of behavior I was alluding to when first stated " I can only hypothesize but this incident IMO smacks of misdirected group driven behavior". In a group where there is a common goal, the adrenaline is flowing and the egos are flying high; the best of us can be allured into doing things we might not have otherwise done. Even if the readily apparent consequences are questionable. This is where an experienced and well grounded leader can make all the difference. If he or she is not the results can be dire.