Is the nearly impossible mechanism to obtain permits to hike Half Dome to blame for the death of a hiker this week?
I had an interesting conversation with my neighbor regarding the hiker that just recently perished on Half Dome this week as we’re both a 2-3 degrees of separation from her. What was an eye opener in the conversation is that few people hiked Half Dome that day because of questionable weather. Did the people who hiked Half Dome that day risk the questionable weather because it is so difficult to obtain permits? Or because there is no mechanism to redeem permits on another day if “rained out” (bigger risk being lightening)? Seems ironic that the permits could actually result in accidental deaths when they’re in place to prevent them from overcrowding.
Hikers Climbing the Cables on Half Dome - Yosemite, California
The Yosemite NPS Half Dome Day Hike site does say not to summit in bad weather, but there is no mention of a mechanism such as a “raincheck” provided by the BLM if conditions do not permit a safe summit. With such a difficult permit to obtain and such a long hike people who reach the cables might be unnecessarily tempted to ascend when they might otherwise try again another day.
Hikers Climbing the Cables on Half Dome - Yosemite, California (zoom)
From an example BLM site:
Can I get a “raincheck” after I pay my fees?
You can get a raincheck for the XXXXX permit areas only if you attempted to reach the trailhead and were unsuccessful. You may then apply for a raincheck voucher in person at the XXXXX Contact Station (or XXXXXOffice in the winter). You may redeem your raincheck voucher, at no cost, for a replacement permit dated within 30 days following your original permit, or within the same 30 day period the following year. Call the permits desk (xxx-xxx-xxxx) or the XXXXX Strip District Office (xxx-xxx-xxxx) with your voucher number to obtain a replacement permit.
Raincheck example: John Smith has a permit for 2 people to hike to XXXXX on March 18th, 2010 and he and his hiking partner are unable to get to the XXXXX Trailhead because XXXXX is flooded. Mr. Smith travels to the XXXXX Contact Station and applies for a raincheck voucher. He is issued a voucher that he may redeem for another permit before April 17th, 2010 or between March 19th and April 17th, 2011.
What are your thoughts?
Hikers Climbing the Cables on Eastern Shoulder of Half Dome - Yosemite, California
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[tags]NPS, Yosemite, Half Dome, permit, cable, hike, hiker[/tags]
That is way too many people on those cables! Seriously. One fall could take hundreds out.
These photos were taken well before the permit process was in place. To date these let’s just say they were taken on slide film.
Jim, I think you are looking a bit too hard here. The NPS cannot really offer rain checks, and most park visitors are on schedules that would not allow them to reschedule anyway.
If there is an issue here – and I have no first hand knowledge of this specific incident- it is more likely that either people were caught unawares on the summit of the peak as bad weather came in, or that they failed to heed the warnings about this very issue that are posted on the route. I have done the cable route a few times (and one technical route on the opposite side of the dome) and my recollection is that signs on the route are very specific about the mortal danger of attempting the summit in stormy weather.
One contributing factor is that many people who hike Half Dome have very minimal and sometimes no previous experience on routes like this. Combine this with a certain macho attitude among some of those on the route, and the effect this has on the inclination to keep going in conditions that would scare those with more experience and you have a psychological danger.
It is the nature of the wild world that nothing is certain. There is no guarantee that a storm won’t interrupt your trip. Rocks may fall. Mosquitos may drive you back into your tent. The bear may charge you or amble away in the opposite direction. The fish may bite… or not. Nature doesn’t offer rain checks. 🙂
Overall, if anything, the permit system is going to decrease dangers on the climb and reduce the overall number of deaths and injuries.
Take care,
Dan
I get the vibe people are prone to push ahead. The example BLM raincheck text quoted in my post allows people to reschedule to return if they can’t do the hike in the same trip. I’m all for accountability, but being the permit system is in a trial run it would seem they might want to think about ways to address this.
People do need to be accountable for their actions and there are ample warning signs. But I also think the permit system needs to adapt as well.
In this case I do think circumstances were unfortunate. I’ve not heard from people directly on the hike, but merely from word of mouth about what may have happened. Regardless of the circumstances I’d hate to think good judgement was compromised because of pressures like an imperfect permitting system with rigid timeframes. Sadly we saw good judgement compromised even in Hetch Hetchy due to perceived time pressure by hikers when a bridge was overflowing with water. Sadly those hikers (educated folks) decided to risk the walk over for not wanting to walk an extra day resulting in 2 deaths.Food for thought.
I really wonder how many people would be extra motivated to complete the Half Dome hike in spite of bad weather just because they had a permit for only that day. Considering that people regularly made this same decision in similar conditions prior to permits being implemented and that getting this far on the trail is quite a feat itself–how many people just have summit fever? How many people really want to re-do 80% of the (really difficult) hike they just finished a day or two later when their goal is in sight now?
Even assuming that the permit affects some people’s decisions, here are the choices NPS has:
-Keep permits. People may not always have the choice to hike Half Dome, but they always have the choice to make and implement a safe decision to ascend or to rapidly descend if a storm suddenly moves in. This is one of the things the permit system was designed to allow: a choice to be safe.
-Go back to no permits. People have the unfettered choice to go up to Half Dome whenever. If a storm arrives suddenly with a lot of people on top, these hikers have lost their choice to make a safe decision, because they will not be able to evacuate down the cables quickly because the capacity of the cables is insufficient for the number of people on top who need to use them to escape the storm in a timely manner. So, no permits means a good chance of no choice to make/implement a safe decision.
400 permits (people per day) was chosen because it is approximately the maximum number that would usually allow for free-flowing conditions on the cables and would enable a reasonably quick evacuation of the summit when a storm moves in unexpectedly quickly. If rain checks were issued, how would that work? If NPS issues more than 400 permits, they’ve defeated the purpose of having permits/quota. The only alternative is to issue fewer than 400 permits per day in case there’s a stormy day, so that rain checks could be issued to some of the people who couldn’t use their permits.
I guess the irony is that restrictions (permits) allow hikers to make a choice to be safe while no restrictions (no permits) actually limit hikers’ ability to choose to be safe.
Having just climbed Half Dome in the last couple weeks and currently writing my own post on the subject, I’ll add my own quick observation; despite the rarity of getting a permit, there are PLENTY of warnings, and the NPS expects people to use their own judgment. Personal responsibility is paramount, and more than anything else, it may have been peer pressure within their group to continue despite warnings. The group had been warned not to climb, and foul weather was moving in quickly.
The permit process is in flux and will continue to change over the next couple years. But I’m not sure a ‘rain check’ is the answer. They don’t give rainchecks at the Wave in AZ, and the BLM seems to indicate some act of nature must prevent the public from reaching what would otherwise be an open and accessible trail head. I think in the case of Half Dome where special conditions apply like weather and wilderness, an educational waiver / ackowledgement system would be better, like a simple drivers test at the DMV, but a hikers test that could be given online.
What do you mean there are no rainchecks on the Wave? Check your facts. I was with my family in the Wave last year and it does have a raincheck. You will need to report to the office and they will give you a replacement permit to use within a certain period of time.
The raincheck text in the post is from the BLM site for the Wave in fact. I felt it important to keep the general concept than a location to location comparison.
Good to know, Jim.
I have ascended Half Dome previously and had a really nervous time coming down the cables, partly because I was wearing hard-sole backpacking boots and partly because the cables were jam-packed. I was close to losing my step a couple of times as well, but I survived (probably never to climb that again).
Let me remind you that the overcrowded cables are a menace, not just in bad weather, but in perfectly good weather as well. Just for that, I am glad that they implemented this system. Not that it doesn’t have flaws – there are many things to correct there.
There are plenty of warnings posted enroute. Short of keeping a ranger at Quarterdome barring people from climbing up (which is rather unreasonable), there is not much you can do against the macho bravado. Case in point – the folks who fell off Vernal falls a couple of weeks ago inspite of a metal barrier and multiple warnings that the falls were dangerous.
As they say A common mistake that people make when trying to design something
completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete
fools.
Hey Jim: What’s that old saw? “Guns don’t kill people….” 😉
“Guns don’t kill people, Half Dome does”? I dont think that is how it went. Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying that Permits kill people. It is the first year of the permit system and I think its fair to say this might not be the most obvious thing for people to think about that might lend itself to a minor tweak to remove an element of human nature.
Overall its sad and the more I learn it was just a tragic accident. I would expect the permit system to adapt after seeing how things run this year. Perhaps this will be a topic they take into consideration. Thanks for the comment here on the blog and on Google+!
“Guns don’t kill people, Half Dome does”? I dont think that is how it went. Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying that Permits kill people. It is the first year of the permit system and I think its fair to say this might not be the most obvious thing for people to think about that might lend itself to a minor tweak to remove an element of human nature.
Overall its sad and the more I learn it was just a tragic accident. I would expect the permit system to adapt after seeing how things run this year. Perhaps this will be a topic they take into consideration. Thanks for the comment here on the blog and on Google+!
“Guns don’t kill people, Half Dome does”? I dont think that is how it went. Don’t get me wrong I’m not saying that Permits kill people. It is the first year of the permit system and I think its fair to say this might not be the most obvious thing for people to think about that might lend itself to a minor tweak to remove an element of human nature.
Overall its sad and the more I learn it was just a tragic accident. I would expect the permit system to adapt after seeing how things run this year. Perhaps this will be a topic they take into consideration. Thanks for the comment here on the blog and on Google+!
“I really wonder how many people would be extra motivated to complete the Half Dome hike in spite of bad weather just because they had a permit for only that day.”
I think the problem isn’t “how many”, but that the people most likely to do so are also the ones least qualified to be up there in those conditions. That’s my worry; the folks most likely to get in trouble over this are the ones arrogant about or oblivious to their limitations.
how about 50% of the permits only being made available starting at 6PM the day before, and only on the valley floor via some electronic signup system. And to stop the scalpers, permits are given to a specific name, and not transferable, so if that person isn’t part of the party, the permit isn’t valid.
I think a simple virtual rain-check for Half Dome could be implemented pretty easily.
During inclement weather, the ranger checking the Half Dome permits at the subdome could offer people, as an incentive not to climb the cables that day, a rain-check that would permit early-bird access to a Half Dome permits “pre-sale” for the following year.
The ranger wouldn’t even have to hand out actual rain-checks. Instead in a notebook he could write the permit-holder’s name and email address, and then a week prior to the pre-sale of the following year Half Dome permits, those who requested the rain check would receive via email a passcode that would permit them to purchase Half Dome permit for that one they didn’t use the previous year.
And if the weather in Yosemite is really bad from the morning on on the day of someone’s Half Dome permit, these “virtual rain-checks” could also be issued at the Wilderness Center in Yosemite Valley. That way people wouldn’t have to waste time and effort hiking to the subdome to sign-up for a rain-check.
I think that any attempt by a public agency to protect people from themselves will set a very bad precedent. The root of the problem is the sense of many visitors that there should be some kind of guarantee of safety in a wild place and that they are absolved from responsibility to know what they’re doing and to make sure it is within their ability.
If you shift the burden to the NPS, it won’t be long before there are protective fences, rails, signs, or even a tram to get people to the top at the expense of the experience itself.
People pay tens of thousands of dollars for permits to climb Everest. Many of them never make the summit. They know the risks and the costs and accept them and are prepared to turn back even just feet from the top. There’s no reason a place like Half Dome should be any different.
When people are released from responsibility for THEIR OWN LIVES, a permit raincheck is not the real problem. The NPS’ role is to make sure visitors are aware that this is not a Disneyworld ride and that visitors should be informed and exercise common sense before putting their very lives on the line. The annoyance of applying for a new permit should be weighed against the odds of dying. That should not be a hard decision.
Guy
Hi Jim: People have been dying on and around Half Dome before the cable permit system went into effect. It’s not the permits or the system; it’s an issue of judgement and error.
Having done the cables during peak season before the permits, I think the permits are doing exactly what they are designed to do: control the flow of people and limit the risks from over crowding. On my ascent, the cables were so chocked full of hikers, I spent half the time on the cables waiting for the line to move. This eventually caused a number of more agressive people to start hopping the line on the cables and putting themselves and their fellow hikers at risk.
The permits will not prevent different acts of risky behavior like being there in bad weather when you shouldn’t. I agree with others that personal responsibility, or specifically the lack there of, was the main cause of the unfortunate death. I don’t think a rain check option, while a nice thing for those of use close to Yosemite or staying long periods in the Park, would not have necessarily prevented this death.
Well, that’s true, but you can’t design to cover everyone. Otherwise, the railing at Vernal Fall, which should work for most people, gets a bit taller to work for more people, then a bit longer to work for even more people, then with twice as many signs to cover a few more people, etc. As for Half Dome, one could make a similar argument without permits, in that people who wait in a long line at the base of the cables are more likely to make a risky attempt as weather worsens because, not only did they hike all this way, but now they’ve waited in line for an hour… and that thunderstorm doesn’t seem so close yet…
Some people will make poor decisions and some of those people may be influenced by the scarcity of permits. Having been educated, that’s their decision to make, and that’s the nature of wilderness. What makes wilderness real is that it allows people to make decisions and to take risks, and the consequences of those decisions and risks can be very bad. Without decisions, without risk, there is no wilderness, no matter how undeveloped and wild a place is.
For an alternate view read this highly accurate news report:
http://www.savehalfdome.org/_1./News_-_Half_Dome_Fatality.html
or visit the TRUE VOICE OF THE PEOPLE at
http://www.savehalfdome.org
It is obvious to me that this group (Mr. Deutsch) is trying to capitalize by sealing mugs and other items by promoting useless propaganda about the permit process and that somehow our rights are being violated. His uninformed rant is easy to buy and sounds good. Unforgivably he is creating fear and opposition against the Park service…:-( and in the end it will hurt all of us who RESPECT and understand why such permits are needed.