Time: Sunday, July 21, roughly 7:30 AM
Place: Driving on US Hwy 95, headed north out of Las Vegas and towards Mount Charleston
This is a summary of the conversation and not a verbatim transcript.
Me: I sure am glad the Carpenter 1 fire is under control.
Him: Well, only 95% under control, but they can’t get to where it is and it can’t get out either. I wonder if we are going to see any burned areas.
Me: I don’t think so. It jumped Kyle Canyon Road, but it never got as far as Lee Canyon Road.
Him: It’s going to take a long time to get back to normal. Mary Jane Falls is probably going to be closed for months.
Me: What about Cathedral Rock? I heard the fire got very close.
Him: Yeah, that too. But Mary Jane Falls is a better hike. Harder, and very rocky, but worth it.
Me: So I was watching the news the other day. They were pointing out that up on the mountain, you should be careful in burned areas because trees might fall and ash might cover places you could fall.
Him: Yeah, we were told that in the meeting Friday too.
Time: Monday, July 22, roughly 9 PM
Place: Mary Jane Falls
A hiker — not the gentleman in the first part of our story — is stranded on a cliff. The only way to rescue him is by helicopter. In the process, a police officer from an elite search and rescue team falls to his death.
Aftermath
I wasn’t going to cover this as it is mostly “local interest,” but CNN thought it was newsworthy so here we are.
There are a lot of great places to hike around the Las Vegas Valley, and Mount Charleston is a favorite in the middle of summer because it’s substantially cooler up there. In the winter, there is even skiing.
So the short version. This hiker knew or should have known the following:
- Mary Jane Falls is a tough hike in good conditions, and conditions were not good.
- It was well publicized that thanks to the recent forest fire, hikers need to be extra vigilant about hazards on the trails.
- It turns out my companion was mistaken and the trail was open, but extra caution was still in order. I had been going to make a rather tasteless joke about how, like the character in Clerks, he shouldn’t even have been there.
- I am going to assume the hiker started during daylight, because it would have been incredibly stupid to hike potentially dangerous terrain with an awesome view at night.
Go ahead and come hike around Las Vegas. But for pity sake, use your head. Don’t be like this guy, who got a cop killed rescuing him.
In Closing: Nate Silver; interpreting stats on research papers; read it all before letting your knee get all jerky; glad somebody in the administration has balls; and yoga with cats.