Rescue and a casualty in Death Valley

[Jeffrey]

Shame. These people made some crucial wrong decisions. Sure, a sat phone would have helped, but experience and smarts are first and foremost.

[larrie]

My wife and I were talking about this at dinner. It is a very sad situation. I reminded her that I carry an inReach and tire repair kit in case anything happens when I/we are exploring. An inReach or other PLB a critical piece of gear.

[Bellpilot]

We carry an InReach as well and have it on a Garmin mount in the SMB so it is charged all the time. Put it in the backpack when hiking just in case we have an emergency or run into others that may be in one. I have heard to many stories of having to leave a person in distress to go find help and never want to be in that situation.

[dhally]

We're not too worried about getting stranded in the van, since we carry lots of food and water, and we stay mostly on graded roads. OTOH I have been places on my motorcycle where a breakdown or tip over could spell very hard times.

I guess I'm a bit fatalistic because I don't carry a PLB.

[Flux]

I have young kids. Sat SOS device is a must for me.

[rallypanam]

I was down there last week when this all went down.. saw a bunch of military copters and wondered what the story was.

As many said, a base model satellite tracker. Or better decision making. They could have easily walked back to furnace creek wash, a pretty heavily travelled road, but instead went down willow canyon without knowledge or experience. RIP.

[bozwell13]

So, so sad, bad decisions can kill you. My first thought is its interesting that they were in an AWD Subaru, you can drive on a flat tire, just go, if it ruins the tires, ruins the wheels, ruins the car, who cares? Very few people turn around and go out the way they came in, the mind plays tricks. Every person on here should read Deep Survival by Lawrence Gonzales, best book ever and must for anyone that leaves the pavement and even for those that dont.

[rt66paul]

I got off the beaten path in Death Valley on my motorcycle 20 years ago. I stopped to stretch my legs, dropped a glove on the ground, when I picked it up, my back went out. My cell phone did not have coverage. Believe me, It was very hard to get back on the bike and drive until I could find a motel. I was there 2 days - thankfully I had pain meds with me.
I still have nightmares about being out there all alone with my bike and not being able to get out. I will never put myself in that position again.

[Kibo]

Such a sad story, but hopefully we can all learn from this--what would we do in a similar situation, and how can we be better prepared for such an emergency?

Like Flux, I have young kids so an InReach was a no-brainer (although, the justification was actually that I needed a tracker for mountain biking the Colorado Trail Race last year).

It's great that we have access to technology like this these days, but not everyone can justify the expense. For anyone that's on the fence or hasn't considered buying one, maybe reconsider...cost vs consequences (risk-based decision making).

[Aldercrest]

Spot and other positioners are great. My brother has one which is great for updates when he’s out on his motorcycle. Does anyone have any input about HAM radios for emergency use?