Death Valley Off-Road Adventures

Bastard...wish we had gallows for this type of jackass
https://www.nps.gov/deva/learn/news/guilty-plea-for-looting.htm

 

Indeed. Gallows, Brazen Bull, etc. Maybe some Timbisha Shoshone go to his home.

 

I can not even comprehend the selfishness and lack of any sort of morals people like this have. Every time I see someones name carved into a petroglyph I hope that person dies of ball cancer. Ugh..

 

http://www.latimes.com/science/la-me-artifacts-20150913-story.html

Bourne is a jackass

In 2011, Bourne and wife Penny paid $1-million restitution to the federal government for causing a fire in 2006 that burned about 7,435 acres of the Inyo National Forest. The fire was sparked by embers from a pit in which the couple had been burning brush.

I really wish our local doctors would stop putting Mammoth on the map for the wrong reasons.

 

"Karch said Bourne "planned to donate his collection to the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History when he died."

So it's all good cause after he was done with the stolen and forever altered artifacts he ruined for future generations they would go to a museum. What an asshole

 

Thinking is apparently not his strong suit.

 

https://www.nps.gov/deva/learn/news/second-heat-fatality.htm


Second Heat-Caused Fatality This Summer in Death Valley

Date: August 31, 2016


DEATH VALLEY, CA –A search on Sunday by multiple agencies concluded when a woman's body was found 5 miles from her vehicle. It appears that this is the second heat-caused fatality in Death Valley National Park. Both fatalities were in the southern end of the park near the unpaved Harry Wade Road.

On Sunday, August 28th, 2016, at approximately 1:11 p.m., deputies from the Barstow Sheriff's Station responded to a report of a missing person in the area of Old Spanish Trail near Baker, California. Pi-Wei Hung (40) was driving from Las Vegas, Nevada to Fort Irwin, California. Hung had not been heard from since August 27th, 2016, at approximately 1:10 p.m., when she was in the Charleston View area of Inyo County.

Personnel from San Bernardino County, Inyo County, Fort Irwin National Training Center, and the National Park Service, along with two helicopters, responded to the remote area to search for Hung. At 2:30 p.m., Hung's vehicle was found along Harry Wade Road. It appears that she may have gotten the vehicle stuck in loose sand in the berm while attempting to turn around.

Hung walked about 5 miles, away from the road. Her body was found at approximately 4:57 p.m. It appeared Hung passed away from heat exposure, according to the San Bernardino County Coroner's office. The day's high temperature was 113 °F.

This is the second heat-related fatality in Death Valley National Park this summer. On Thursday, June 9, park visitors found a deceased motorcyclist on Harry Wade Road. Reinhard Egger, 60, was a German citizen. The man's motorcycle was parked upright and was still functional. According to Inyo County Coroner's Office, Egger died from overheating. It was 118 °F that day.

Death Valley's summer temperatures can quickly turn life-threatening. Cell phones do not work in most of Death Valley National Park, so travelers are safer if they stay on paved roads that are more frequently traveled by other visitors. Visitors and area residents are advised to always carry plenty of water in their vehicle. If a vehicle becomes disabled, travelers should wait with their vehicle until assistance arrives. The vehicle provides shade and makes it easier to be found.

 

Sad and avoidable.

 

^^^This!

 

Folks think that because it's a National Park it's like Disneyland or something. They do all sorts of dumbass stuff and then assume that a ranger will be along shortly to bail them out. And then they discover that, in some places, stupidity is still a capital crime. SMH

 

How did this person end up where she did? Bad GPS directions? That seems somewhat common in DV. I guess it's not thier responsibility but you would think that Google maps/Waze or whatever would update their stuff to not send people accidentally up 4x4 tracks. I know that in humboldt county truckers have been sent up a mountain pass with switchbacks that they get hopelessly stuck on requiring complex recoveries. If google maps can remove stuff like street view of celebrities and politicians houses it can't be hard to make sure someone headed to LA from Las Vegas doesn't end up on dirt in their sedan.

 

Anyone that relies on google to explore DV is already a Darwin nominee.

 

I don't know the specifics but I suspect some of these people are directed into DV without their knowledge of the danger and road conditions. It sounds far fetched but some people blindly follow their GPS into lakes, and other places where they shouldn't be driving. Even experienced truckers have been ending up on a single lane dirt road pass in humboldt north of me .

 

http://kymkemp.com/2015/09/17/big-rig-stuck-on-alderpoint-road-again/

http://www.ttnews.com/articles/basetemplate.aspx?storyid=42172

http://www.sacbee.com/entertainment/living/travel/article2573180.html

 

I don't doubt it.

 

It's impossible to say. I did some testing and G-Maps (at the present time), does not offer a route from Las Vegas to Ft. Irwin that goes up the CA-127. It routes via South I-15 and then turns North around Calico / Barstow as it should.

If I had to speculate, I'd say she looked at a map and thought she could access Ft. Irwin from the North because of Saratoga Springs Rd. and Owl Hole Springs Rd. But there is a huge problem with that. Access is gated and for U.S. contractors only. Or maybe she just wanted to tour DV?

Who knows?

I've traveled the route a number of times and I can attest to the soft sand conditions. Hard to explain in words, but in some places a grader has created huge burms that are 48" tall that would trap a car if it tried to go up.

 

I have to say, when we were young, we did all sorts of crazy out in Death Valley. We took cars (CARS!) with almost no clearance down some crazy roads. (On one trip we tried Lippencott Mine Road in a VW van and a Toyota Corona. We didn't make it.) We explored all the old mines. We got in all kinds of trouble with the rangers. We were out of our minds. But as young and stupid as we were:

• Somebody always knew where we were going and when we were supposed to be back,
• We always had at least two vehicles, usually three,
• We always had ten or fifteen gallons of water with us, and three or four days of food as well,
• And, most importantly, we always went during the winter, or maybe early spring. As far as we were concerned, going during the summertime was suicidal.

I grew up thinking that this was just basic common sense. Apparently it's not, at least not for everyone.

 

In my home town there is a trail that starts in town and ends in Crested Butte and atleast a dozen times a year someone would pull up in a civic or Subaru asking where the road was cause google said it was the best way to get to Crested Butte. They would almost always get pissed off at me when I told them that taking that road would be suicide in their car. One winter I was plowing at 10 p.m. during a really bad snow storm and a Subaru pulled up asking about the road, sorry your not even getting over that pass in the summer let alone when its buried under 20 feet of snow. I wrote to google, yahoo, map quest so many times asking them to take the road off their maps.

Worst was a older couple I came across late fall about 10 miles from town they had been stuck up there for days, ignored the giant "High clearance, 4x4 and experienced drivers only" and headed over the pass, got to a point where they couldn't go forward or back the way they came. No map, no food and no basic recovery tools, they could've easily walked out had they known where they were.

Super sad about this woman, completely avoidable and not a good way to go out.

 

We see a similar challenge with European tourists in Canada.
1) They have no concept of the vastness of the terrain. For them a 4 hour drive is a long drive and they would have passed through dozens of communities, if not another country. To drive two - three hours and not see a single dwelling or commercial establishment is a concept difficult for them to grasp.

2) Terrain - even some of their tallest mountains have access to them by gondolas in Europe. If it's a 'Park' that means simple, easy access is assured. They do not understand the concept of a lack of facilities, even though the wildness is what attracts them. Here in Canada they also expect the forests to be garden like, able to wander anywhere they like under the canopy, with pathways and signs. lol.

 

I gotta say too that 5 miles is a awfully short distance to walk and die from exposure, crazy how quick things can go wrong. I remember in hunter safety course the videos they showed (dramatic renactments) of people diying from hypothermia of heat exposure in short periods of time. I am just glad my girlfriend doesn't roll her eyes when I pack so much gear including my Spot anytime we go anywhere, she shares my take on being prepared for anything!