Geraldine Largay

[brent driggers]

Ive been perplexed by this story for so long now,  I was sad to read this….

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2016/05/26/missing-hiker-found-dead-last-year-kept-journal-ordeal.html?intcmp=hpbt4

 

[Bri W]

Only a half mile from the trail!! That’s so tragic.

[brent driggers]

I think that this is a better article with more information, including a notation that she was a lot farther off trail.

http://www.pressherald.com/2016/05/25/report-geraldine-largay-kept-journal-during-weeks-lost-in-maine-woods/

[Roger Caffin]

A known poor sense of direction, and NO compass.  What can I say?
And she tried to rely on her mobile in an area where there was no connection.

Sympathy to the relatives, and a warning to others: carry a compass!

Cheers

 

 

[DAN-Y]

Always carry a survival fire starting kit and have the know how to use it. She had twine and paper but no sparks. She had glasses that could have been used if the sun shone in the area where she was. It doesn’t take long for hypothermia to set-in.

[Bob Moulder]

Hopefully somebody will learn something from this tragedy.

Not to be disrespectful or judgmental, but I think most of us have seen, at one time or another, people who should not be in the woods alone. Stuff happens and even the most experienced people can be ‘caught out.’ But unfortunately some folks do not have the wilderness skillset and mindset to overcome even small mistakes.

 

[Billy Ray]

Indeed. The wilderness can be a pleasant and benevolent place… that seduces the inexperienced…

Until it’s not. Then you better have some wilderness smarts.

billy

[Justin Baker]

Something about this does not sound right. If you had a map, compass, and a very general idea of where you were, you should be able to walk in one direction until you run into a linear feature like a trail or road. Did this person not even have a map or compass? Was there an injury involved?

[Roger Caffin]

Read the articles Justin. Trail map (=sketch map?), no compass and apparently no fire lighting. Unsafe at any speed.

Cheers

EDIT: I stand corrected. She had a compass, albeit tiny, and she had fire lighting. The mind boggles then. Poor girl.

 

 

[L T]

Based on the description of her skills ( or lack thereof) and temperament in the articles, a SPOT  ( 4oz) or similar would have been a wise investment and may have been able to save Ms. Largay’s life.

 

 

[Greg Deitrick]

The inventory included:

“1 orange waterproof match holder:  inside were 22 matches, 2 small birthday type candles”

“key chain temp gauge with compass”

“yellow whistle”

“2 bic type lighters”

So a compass, although not much of one.  It seems that the 2 critical items she was missing were a plan to keep from getting lost and a plan for what to do if lost.

At my level of inexperience getting lost is frequently possible.  Never again will I feel stupid about taking a compass bearing before heading off the trail to go poop.  Especially when hiking solo.  It wouldn’t be a bad idea to hang a flag at the point I leave the trail to help me find it when I’m done.

[Link .]

An inventory list in a missing person report in the case file said Largay left her SPOT GPS device behind in a motel and “has compass but does not or won’t use it.”

[Jonathan Patt]

She did have a SPOT and left it behind. She had a compass but didn’t know how to (or chose not to learn how to) use it. Her navigational skills were poor enough that she would frequently get lost even when walking with a partner.

It’s still not a foolproof solution, but people with poor navigation skills should probably invest in a low power GPS that, if nothing else, constantly records a track when it’s on. If you get lost, you just follow that track back the way you came. This does become more challenging to manage on long distance trips, but can be done.

[Billy Ray]

In 40 years of backpacking and serious climbing I have never needed a compass or a map or any other kind of navigation device to go a short distance off trail to the ‘bathroom’. But it is important to be paying attention as you hike… pay attention to the the direction of the trail… is it going generally north/south?, east/west?… this can usually be understood simply by noticing the position of the sun and the time of day… pay attention to the terrain… gullies, hills, ridges, creeks, etc. and your position relative to them…. when you leave the trail notice where you are walking relative to the above… turn around and notice what it looks like heading back to the trail… if complex terrain or heavily wooded use markers like sticks making arrows or rock carins to get you back to the trail… Geez this is all simple basic stuff. Not sure what her experience level was, but if she did not know these things she should not have been out there alone.

Billy

[L T]

So sad.  That does explain the lack of a SPOT device.  A series of both small and large errors that led to a tragic result.  Most of us who have been in tough spots but lived to tell the tale can reflect back and identify seemingly insignificant ( at the time) mistakes or lapses in judgement that came back to haunt us in a big way down the line.  Leaving the SPOT in a motel room is an example here.  I’ve certainly ” been there, done that” a few times, but luckily come through a little scarred, but wiser.  My heart does go out to Ms. Largay, and I feel badly that she died cold, scared , hungry and alone.

[Jonathan Patt]

I’ve never needed a compass (or a GPS) to avoid getting lost either. (I do carry a GPS and use it regularly, but this is more for a combination of collecting data for mapmaking, and to aid in finding lost/abandoned trails, rather than as a primary navigation tool to avoid getting lost.) In fact, despite frequently hiking off-trail or on trails that disappear constantly, I haven’t ever gotten lost at all. There are times where I’ve lost the trail, certainly, or not known quite where I was in one sense, but I always have a general sense of where I’ve come from and have not had any issues going back the way I came.

However, it seems that there are a lot of people for whom this is not the case. I’ve hiked with people who have navigation skills similar to those described in linked articles in this thread—several steps off the trail and they are baffled as to where they are and don’t know what to do. I don’t know what the factors are that lead to this sort of behavior—is it some innate navigation capability that’s missing, or is it just a lack of practice and a heavy reliance on well-marked trails that has prevented them from naturally developing the ability to see faint trails and sign of where they walked? Or is it something broader, the lack of a mental map of their whereabouts? When I walk somewhere, even somewhere entirely new that I’ve never been in, my mental map of my surroundings is constantly being filled in with new and relevant information without conscious effort, but that doesn’t seem to be the case for everyone.

[Matt Dirksen]

“is it some innate navigation capability that’s missing, or is it just a lack of practice and a heavy reliance on well-marked trails that has prevented them from naturally developing the ability to see faint trails and sign of where they walked?”

While some of us might pick it up easier than others, it’s been proven to be a learned practice, for the most part. Sadly, for those who have it come so easy, an over dependence on gps has been proven to be detrimental to the part of the brain which is responsible for it.

Here is a link to an article which speaks directly to your questions. They have figured out what part of the brain is responsible for “spatial intelligence”.

https://www.gislounge.com/spatial-orientation-and-the-brain-the-effects-of-map-reading-and-navigation/

(Coincidentally, I just got back from the AIA Convention in Philadelphia where I attended a seminar about this subject in relation to architects.)

 

[Jonathan Patt]

It definitely makes sense to me as something which is learned, some people just seem to have a very difficult time learning it.

I can only speak for myself and other people I know who are skilled navigators and extensively use GPS, but I suspect it depends how you use GPS. If you just mindlessly follow an arrow and don’t use it as one of many inputs to your mental map, it can probably have detrimental effects on your abilities. But I’ve found my skills navigating without GPS grow even during periods of heavy use of GPS.

[James holden]

it really depends on the terrain as much as the person

for example in exceptionally rugged coastal forest  (minimum 100-200+ ft trees all over) there may simply be no LOS … theres ravines all over the place … and theres a good chance youll be in fog, rain or clouds …

when those SAR folks up here did searches for folks up the “fools gold trail” (were folks have been rescued an sometimes never been found), they could only move a few KM every day as the terrain was very rugged and needed to take constant bearings just to stay on course

and then there are whiteout (or grey out if in fog/clouds) conditions …

 

 

 

[Ralph Burgess]

Matt, good article – thanks for the post.   That’s a really interesting article, especially the reasearch about GPS use.   I just wish science journalists would link to the primary research, though – and, well, actually read the primary research.   Most of the citations at the foot of the page are other newspaper articles, which is really lazy.

I’d just take issue with one thing you said

While some of us might pick it up easier than others, it’s been proven to be a learned practice, for the most part.

There’s certainly good evidence that navigation skills improve with training.    But I’m not aware of any research (nor is there any referenced in that article) that shows that there is not also substantial innate variation in navigation skills.   It would not be any easy thing to test – are you aware of any studies?

[Matt Dirksen]

“But I’m not aware of any research (nor is there any referenced in that article) that shows that there is not also substantial innate variation in navigation skills.   It would not be any easy thing to test – are you aware of any studies?”

Nope – not aware of any.

However, since researchers have proven (or at least seen clear evidence) that a person’s gender play’s into how someone gathers spatial information, I would certainly suspect that nature does definitely play a role, and do believe that some folks simply have an easier time learning map & compass skills than others, just by who they are. I’ve certainly taught orienteering to enough scouts in my time to be convinced of this.  But I couldn’t imagine how one could create a controlled enough study to draw any formal conclusions out of how nature plays a role. (Unless they use fmri on infants and track their hypothalamus over a bunch of years.)

For me, the sad situation with Geraldine Largay is that she was an AT thru-hiker who I understand was almost done with her trip, and somehow she never considered that learning (and practicing) orienteering skills might become as important as other essential outdoor skills – especially when traveling alone. As Eric mentioned, there are many potential situations (even on the AT) where familiar markers might simply disappear into the fog, and not having a core understanding of where I was, where I am, and where I want to go could become downright treacherous.

[Ralph Burgess]

For me, the sad situation with Geraldine Largay is that she was an AT thru-hiker who I understand was almost done with her trip, and somehow she never considered that learning (and practicing) orienteering skills might become as important as other essential outdoor skills – especially when traveling alone.

Yes – especially since it seems she was already aware that her navigational skills were terrible.

There are so many opportunities to improve your skills when the penalty for failure is not starvation and death.  When you’re a passenger on a long car trip – get a map, plan the route, turn off the GPS and be navigator.   When you’re hiking in a group with more experienced people, ask to lead the group, with nobody else intervening unless you ask for help, and then ask for a critical assessment of your performance afterwards.   As your skills improve, make short off-trail excursions alone (there’s no substitute for a little pressure) but in easy terrain with GPS backup just in case.

There’s simple stuff that I do automatically that I’ve learnt 90% of people never do.    Whatever I’m doing, whether hiking or wandering around town or driving, I always know which way’s north – if I don’t, I stop until I’m oriented.

And something that’s frequently forgotten when you can’t see landmarks is that the stopwatch is a key part of dead-reckoning navigation.   It’s something that should be practised when on trails, in order to be able to estimate speed accurately.   Then when off trail, if you note your time at each definite landmark, hold a steady heading and judge your approximate speed, you can walk through a dense forest in fog with a whole lot more confidence.

[[ Drew ]]

Here is something that hasn’t really been discussed: She survived, ostensibly, for 26 days or more – her last journal article was dated, but who knows if she lived beyond that last entry.

That seems like a long time to survive for someone that was lacking survival skills.  Clearly she would have had to find other food sources during that time or else she would have just slowly starved, which is also possible I guess.

IMO it seems more likely that she mis-dated the journal entries, which sounds weird, but who knows?  Maybe she knew she was going to die and wanted it to seem like she lived longer?  I mean no disrespect to her, but I find it odd that someone would spend 26+ days lost only about 30min (according to one article) from the AT.

[Billy Ray]

I wonder if she just gave up and adopted an mind-set that she was hopelessly lost and there was noting she could do but wait… and maybe she was obeying the advice to ‘just stay put’.

When I get disoriented and not sure exactly how to get back I adopt the attitude: I’m not lost; I know exactly where I am: I’m right here. I just have to find where the road or trail or car is. And then I logically explore or retrace my steps. The trick is to not panic.

I mean it’s crazy… 26 days! She could have marked her location and walked a mile in each direction each day and then back to her marker if she did not find the trail that day. Even if she only did one direction a day she would have found the trail easily within 4 days!!!

It is very disconcerting that someone could get lost so close to the trail and not find their way back and even die… doesn’t make a lot of sense to me… unless maybe she had some kind of dementia.

billy

billy

[Jonathan Patt]

As a discussion elsewhere speculated, it seems probable that she

1. Went off-trail a short distance to use the restroom
2. Didn’t yet realize she didn’t know where the trail was anymore and started walking to where she thought it was, then at some point realized she hadn’t found it and had been going the wrong way and now no longer even knew where she was when she first started going the wrong way
3. Started to panic and got herself even further away from the trail in a further attempt to find it, possibly over several days as she wandered around and tried to find a point with a cell signal, etc.
4. Eventually decided she’d just continued to make things worse and lost confidence that further movement could help her find a sign of civilization and set up a permanent camp without venturing out again out of fear, which ultimately prevented her from potentially finding a way out over the next few weeks

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