This is a signage issue. Change the signs to read: “Visitors leaving the boardwalk may be/have been boiled alive”.
I think this will largely solve the problem.
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Risks for a potential benefit or good, sure. Those are worth taking and deserve being rewarded.
Taking a risk because you don’t like the view and disregard the advice of experienced people that breaking these particular rules can be fatal? No, not the same thing. Valor isn’t traipsing onto fragile ground over boiling acid so you can get a nice photo.
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I do know how unfunny that is.
But if you think it-- in John Cleese’s voice?
It becomes quite funny.
jw1
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I’m one of those people who stand on the boardwalk and think “what if this railing gave away right… NOW!” and get freaked out. Can’t even fathom wanting to take a shot at walking that. Plus you already know that any disturbance to the surface of much of those features can do irreparable harm to microbes, which will result on messing with the wildlife and disfiguring their natural beauty. So, even if you’re dumb enough to hang your life on a slender peg, you’d think maybe you’d give a crap enough about delicate environments to not impose yourself on them.
Any way you slice it: not saying he had it coming, but he didn’t completely not deserve it either.
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Probably a nicer way of saying “we’re not risking our lives and the health of a delicate environment to pull out the horrific remains of your bull-headed kid.” They gave it a shot, saw that it would take some doing to achieve only bringing in an awful corpse, and chalked it up to evolution.
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Man, no kidding. I never experienced altitude sickness until last year between Yellowstone and Grand Teton. I’d taken reasonable care, but clearly not enough. I couldn’t believe how quickly and totally I went from feeling great to feeling like the world was slipping away. My wife, who had been religious about taking daily doses of chlorophyl and staying hydrated, just shook her hand and somehow managed to not say “I told you so.”
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Perhaps only heavy fines might dissuade people from ignoring the warning signs.
???
My sister had to leave a group trip (she was the teacher-in-charge) to Yellowstone due to altitude sickness. This is less likely to happen if you drive there vs flying there. Really sucked.
This is natural selection at work. As with the woman in Australia who went for a midnight swim in a crocodile preserve, walking around in a restricted area of an active caldera is asking for it.
Well, that looks incredibly stupid.
What was Shitburner doing in Yellowstone—outside of lots of dying?
Mother Nature… BENGHAZIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!
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Come now. These adventurous Americans have a constitutional right to make a fool of themselves whenever they want. Who needs rules or regulations? Trump has given every idiot in the country (every citizen of the world really) the license to act in whatever irresponsible way they want and take a selfie of the act to share on Facebook.
Common sense has no meaning any longer when you start having politicians decide who can marry, worship or even go to the bathroom.
I truly feel for the family and friends of this young man. Considering his final act in this world, they probably knew he was never going to listen to reason or to anyone else but himself. It’s a real shame when a young life is cut so short.
Some conservatives will probably argue that he died exercising his religious freedom to be closer to his Maker or 1st Amendment right to freedom of speech by getting the best pose of the day on Instagram . And they would be horribly wrong.
May he rest in peace. That was no easy way to die. The guys who commandeered that bear cub are lucky they are still alive.
lots of youtube videos of YS bison knocking over Harley Davidsons and their riders
For example, the folks from Kenya who “rescued” the bison calf the other day. The calf subsequently had to be put down.
^Burp!^
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“Gruesome Hot Spring Death Highlights Problems At Yellowstone”
Ah, what might those problems be?
Here’s one. It’s a problem to bathe in a vast natural vat of near boiling concentrated sulfurous acid.
Just maybe the warning signs need to be a bit more graphic and scary.
Not too different from the deaths a few years ago of three tourists who thought it would be a great idea to climb over the fence at the top of Vernal Falls in Yosemite to take pictures wading in the pool above the falls. All three got caught in the current and were swpt over the edge. The warning signs there now starkly reference those events.
They were similar in age (21 to 22) to this man (23). Stupid of course but really tragic too. They were all so young. Just kids really. It’s important to survive your 20s.
Yeah – altitude sickness is terrible for those afflicted! I pretty tolerant, but I learned in college that many are not We didn’t do anything illegal or really dangerous, just dumb.
My hiking buddy and I spent a week in RMNP. Toward the end of the trip, we took a circuitous, three day route on our way to climb Longs Peak (14,259 ft). We had book-packs, childhood sleepover sleeping bags, and a cheap dome tent. We didn’t bring nearly enough water, so we drank from the streams along the way. Neither of us got giardiasis, fortunately.
We camped the night in the boulder field at the base of Long’s at 12,400 feet. We survived a really long, cold night, but my friend awoke to a headache and nausea. He convinced me to go on up alone while he waited in the campsite. I returned a few hours later to find a lot of undigested breakfast scattered around, but no friend. I ended up trying to catch him on the hike down, but the only evidence I saw proving he was still alive was intermittent splashes of vomit. I finally caught up to him at the parking lot.
He couldn’t tolerate any food, and could barely even keep water down, though we had descended to 8500 ft. We “slept” that night in the car, with him throwing up every hour or so. His nausea didn’t subside until well into the drive home as we neared sea level. His experience made me very aware of the need to acclimate and hydrate whenever I go up that high. Everest, anyone?
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Don’t forget Reagan and his “user fees” euphemism for hidden flat taxes.
The worst hazard at the park where this kid worked was probably Canada geese. Still, coming from a state with volcanoes, he should have known.
Basic rule of rescues is the rescuers are under no obligation to rescue and if more lives are put in peril than may be saved it’s just not done.
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