Conne family’s ordeal should serve as a reminder to all of us to be prepared

Some hap­py news this week­end: A fam­i­ly that had got­ten lost on the Ore­gon coast while out pick­ing mush­rooms were found alive (though hun­gry and with minor injuries) by search and res­cue teams, who pin­point­ed the fam­i­ly’s where­abouts after they were spot­ted from a heli­copter pilot­ed by Jack­son Coun­ty Com­mis­sion­er John Rachor, who was fly­ing with Cur­ry Coun­ty sher­if­f’s lieu­tenant John Ward.

The fam­i­ly was res­cued by the Coast Guard and tak­en to a local hos­pi­tal in Gold Beach, where they recount­ed their ordeal.

Belin­da and Daniel Conne, both forty-sev­en, moved from Okla­homa last year to Ore­gon with their twen­ty-five year old son Michael. They had been stay­ing in and around Gold Bar while look­ing for work, accord­ing to news reports.

On Jan­u­ary 29th, they left their camp­site at the Port of Gold Beach’s Hunt­ley Park River­side Camp­ground (view loca­tion) to go pick mush­rooms. They drove a lit­tle ways up into the Kla­math Moun­tains, parked their Jeep Chero­kee, and head­ed off on foot. They brought one load of mush­rooms back to their vehi­cle, but they got lost while try­ing to retrieve their sec­ond load.

That’s when their trou­bles began.

In the heat of the after­noon, they left their jack­ets at the end of a grav­el road. Their last meal was a peanut but­ter sand­wich each on Sun­day [Jan­u­ary 29th, 2012].

When they did­n’t come home the first night, the camp host alert­ed author­i­ties. Searchers hit the ground Mon­day. Wednes­day, searchers found the Connes’ Jeep.

The Connes spent the first night in rain, shel­ter­ing under a pile of brush. The sec­ond day, they built a lean-to, but it fell down. Heed­ing the advice of anoth­er mush­room pick­er, Michael Conne hiked uphill to try to see where they were, but returned cold, wet, and with no bet­ter idea where they were. Try­ing to find their way out down­hill, they dis­cov­ered a hol­low log they could all squeeze into, and they stayed there, cov­er­ing the open­ing with bark and hik­ing down­hill to a creek to fill plas­tic bags with water. When it rained, they tried to plug the leaks with bits of wood.

On the sixth day, the fam­i­ly even­tu­al­ly man­aged to reach a clear­ing, where they sig­naled for help using a pock­et knife and the screen of a Black­Ber­ry smart­phone. Unbe­knownst to them, they were only about a quar­ter of a mile from a road, and only around a mile away from their vehicle.

As men­tioned ear­li­er, all three were air­lift­ed to safe­ty and com­fort in Gold Beach; their pit bull walked out of the woods with search and res­cue crews.

While this sto­ry has a hap­py end­ing, it ought to serve as a reminder to us all that it’s incred­i­bly impor­tant to be pre­pared when going out into a remote area. If the Connes had been bet­ter equipped, and had their wits about them, they would­n’t have had to spend six days shiv­er­ing in the foothills of the Kla­math Mountains.

Their first mis­take was not both­er­ing to bring any prop­er nav­i­ga­tion­al tools with them. They did have a Black­Ber­ry, but smart­phones — even those run­ning Black­Ber­ry OS, the world’s most ver­sa­tile mes­sag­ing plat­form — do not make suit­able back­coun­try nav­i­ga­tion­al aids.

They should have tak­en an tak­en topo­graph­ic maps and a com­pass with them, so they could ori­ent them­selves on unfa­mil­iar terrain.

(They could also have pur­chased or rent­ed a hand­held GPS unit, but a GPS is a nice-to-have item, not a sub­sti­tute for maps and a compass.)

Their sec­ond mis­take was not bring­ing any portable shel­ter or emer­gency rations with them. After they found them­selves lost, they did not have any snacks, let alone ingre­di­ents for a meal. Had they had rations to fall back on, they would prob­a­bly have been in bet­ter spir­its, and they would have had more ener­gy, which might have giv­en them the resolve they need­ed to find their way out of the woods. (Remem­ber, they were only a quar­ter mile from a road when they were found).

And, if they had had a light­weight tent, they could have pitched it and gone inside dur­ing the nights, instead of try­ing to try­ing to build a fort of ever­green boughs or try­ing to make a hol­low log waterproof.

And what were they think­ing, aban­don­ing their jack­ets “in the heat of the after­noon”? That’s some­thing a savvy out­doors­man (or out­door­swoman) nev­er does. The way to stay com­fort­able while in the back­coun­try is to dress in lay­ers. Out­er­wear that’s not being used dur­ing the warmest parts of the day should be fold­ed up and put into back­packs for use dur­ing the cool­er hours.

Any­one who has learned wilder­ness sur­vival skills, or been part of the Scout­ing move­ment, is prob­a­bly famil­iar with the Ten Essen­tials, which are the key to sur­viv­ing in the back­coun­try. They are:

1. Nav­i­ga­tion (map and compass)
2. Sun pro­tec­tion (sun­glass­es and sunscreen)
3. Insu­la­tion (extra clothing)
4. Illu­mi­na­tion (headlamp/flashlight)
5. First-aid sup­plies
6. Fire (water­proof matches/lighter/candles)
7. Repair kit and tools
8. Nutri­tion (extra food)
9. Hydra­tion (extra water)
10. Emer­gency shelter

If the Connes had been car­ry­ing the Ten Essen­tials, they would have fared much, much bet­ter after find­ing them­selves lost. But, judg­ing from the news reports, it sounds like they had almost none of the Ten Essen­tials. They did­n’t even have match­es, so they could not start a fire to keep them­selves warm, or to sig­nal res­cuers. As a result, they end­ed up being pret­ty miserable.

When I was young, I learned to appre­ci­ate the dif­fer­ence between back­coun­try and front­coun­try camp­ing (also known as car camping).

Back­coun­try treks require far more prepa­ra­tion than fron­coun­try camp­ing trips, because you can’t take bulky items like propane lanterns, two-burn­er stoves, or fam­i­ly-sized tents. You have to have the prop­er gear. You plan out your meals, fig­ure out what you’ll need to stay warm, where you might want to camp if you’re going on an overnight out­ing, and you always, always, always tell some­one where you’re going and when you expect to be back. You don’t just disappear.

To be com­fort­able and safe in the back­coun­try, you trav­el light and you trav­el pre­pared. You don’t take what you don’t need, for every unnec­es­sary item only adds to the weight you’ll have to carry.

These rules apply to day trips in the back­coun­try as well as overnight trips. The Conne fam­i­ly did­n’t fol­low the rules, and as a con­se­quence, they spent near­ly a week try­ing to sur­vive in the woods with­out shel­ter or sustenance.

If you’re ever going out into the back­coun­try, you owe it to your­self and the peo­ple who care about you to plan ahead. If you don’t know how to get out­fit­ted for a back­coun­try trip, and you don’t have a good friend who can advise you, go talk to the good peo­ple at REI. They’ll be able to help make your trip a much more pleas­ant and safe experience.