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That drat Satyr posted:People in distress make really strange decisions. Red flags tied to the stick looks like they may have been trying to signal planes or people or something.
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Mar 19, 2018 23:55
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It could've been another case, but weren't there some of their phone pictures being mostly black sky, that some people assume were them trying to get someone's attention with a camera flash?
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Mar 20, 2018 00:00
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That's this one, yeah.
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Mar 20, 2018 00:17
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Basebf555 posted:Two of the guys really seem like they should've been intelligent and aware enough not to drive 50 miles in the wrong direction and then go randomly wandering off into the woods with no proper cold weather gear. All five of these guys weren't like developmentally disabled to the point that they couldn't live on their own and function, one of them had a car and was driving after all. I'm not going to argue my theory anymore, but did want to answer this question. The "leader" was Gary Matthias, who owned the car and was of normal intelligence. He was schizophrenic, but that was by all accounts under control by medication. One of the alternate theories is that he had some kind of episode and led them all off into the woods to die. I have a harder time with that because there were no sign before, but it is also a valid theory.
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Mar 20, 2018 00:25
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The Dutch girls freaks me out because they're clearly just hiking around and having fun and then the caption of a perfectly normal and non-scary picture of a smiling girl says, "shortly later, the first call was made to emergency services". Like, what the gently caress happened. I've read the articles and there are pretty convincing theories that they went too far off the "safe" trail, then tried to cross one of those rope bridges and one of the girls fell, then the other girl tried to leave or find help later and didn't make it. But why the gently caress would anyone try to cross a rope bridge? I mean, they had to know they were off the easy trail by then, there aren't rope bridges on easy trails, that poo poo is dangerous. Maybe I'm a loser goon who is wayyy, way too afraid of heights but if I saw a rope bridge over some rocks and a river I'd nope right the gently caress out and go hike my sweet self back down and drink a margarita. I really don't think there were any other people forcing the girls deeper, but at the same time I can't quite think "inexperienced hikers trying to cross a rope bridge into deep rain forest for the lols" is a good idea. Maybe I'm just a pussy. I'll accept that. The days and days of emergency calls, a bunch of weird cell photos of darkness and the perfectly preserved backpacks after supposedly days of floating down a river are just the icing on this wtf cake. Personally I don't think anyone else was involved, but I don't really understand just what they hell happened, either.
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Mar 20, 2018 00:57
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That's just the thing; in the days of supermarkets and roads and urban planning people frequently forget that 'oh right nature is brutal, navigating in a forest is hard, and you have basic needs for water, food, and shelter that the wild does not automatically provide'. Most people have never been lost in the woods, so they don't know what that's like and how bad it can be. I absolutely believe they could have tried to cross crumbling off-trail infrastructure without understanding the danger, because people often take things like bridges and trails and roads, and their safety travelling on them, for granted. If nothing else, this thread has demonstrated there's no shortage of examples. E: More precisely, I don't think what you're describing is cowardice, it's just that a LOT of people don't have the necessary experience to realize what trouble looks like in hiking and camping before they're hip-deep in it.
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Mar 20, 2018 01:07
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I could also imagine if I was in their position, being disoriented as all hell, and I saw a bridge, I might imagine bridge = sign of civilisation = go in this direction to find people and help.
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Mar 20, 2018 01:20
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In a longform article about those two girls the author mentions that the forest they were hiking in has these "paths" that water clears out on its way down from higher ground. By all accounts it looks not unlike a groomed trail, and I think the last picture of the two actually hiking is taken on one of these gullies. It's easy to get hopelessly lost and trip on wet rocks.
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Mar 20, 2018 01:26
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I do want to point out that the girls did a lot of things right, once they were actually lost. Other people pointed out the flags and the possible use of a camera flash as a makeshift signal, but they also kept their phones off except for the exact same time every day when they made the emergency call, to preserve battery and give people a time to try to contact them.
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Mar 20, 2018 01:30
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13Pandora13 posted:Have I got something nightmare fueling for you. http://www.planecrashinfo.com/lastwords.htm Subtle line yet chilling: 08 Sep 1994 USAir 427 Hang on. What the hell is this?
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Mar 20, 2018 01:45
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That drat Satyr posted:People in distress make really strange decisions. Literally I think it was a jaguar.
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Mar 20, 2018 01:47
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Solice Kirsk posted:Red flags tied to the stick looks like they may have been trying to signal planes or people or something. It might not have been the specific article I linked, but I recall reading at one point in the past that, based on the photos they had recovered it was calculated that at one point a rescue party was less than like 100 meters from a location that the girls could have been at the given time. For me, I think, the unnerving part of any story that involves people being lost in the wilderness is just.. well, what was mentioned by empty sea. I live on the very edge of a wilderness forest and hike in it frequently. It is SO EASY to get lost if you don't know an area, even when you're less than a mile from 'civilization'. Following one wrong trail leads to trying to backtrack, going 'crap where did I come from? Was it this way?", which leads to not being able to find anything that looks familiar and wandering in circles until your friends come and find you and laugh at you for walking in circles right next to the road. I personally also really like the theory that they WERE being pursued - not by a person, but by an animal. Jaguars can stalk prey for days before finally attacking, and the area where the girls were hiking is absolutely filthy with them, and they make some pretty unique sounds that often sound like a human-ish coughy-wheezing sound. If one of them did fall and hurt themselves - say broken leg or ankle, that just makes them even more attractive prey in the end. :ohear: e:fb D:
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Mar 20, 2018 01:56
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Jaguars are also the biggest bastards of all the cats and though they aren't "sneak into your house" murder fiends like leopards, they will absolutely kill the poo poo out of a person should they find one. Most cats, like cougars, are far more shy and don't really want to hunt people, but leopards and jaguars are happy to.
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Mar 20, 2018 02:06
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I saw a lot of 'the night photos are using the flash to scare predators!" and while I can't say it wasn't that, at the same time I'm not sure if that was the case since there were so drat many dark pics. I mean wouldn't most predators be deterred by humans in general, then deterred again by humans being loud and dumb? I can't say to the horrors of having to protect your friend's body from a jaguar but would a flash camera really work after a few flashes? Most animals aren't that stupid, after a few tries of something they figure out if it's harmful or not and an unarmed girl yelling and a camera flash aren't that threatening. Maybe the 2nd accident happened after she fled her friend's body in the dark? It just unnerves me how quick they went from happy photos to emergency calls and then 10 days of hell and then a couple of body parts and a weirdly perfect backpack. I understand accidents happen and they went way too far into the jungle but Christ, how did things go so wrong so fast? And in such a way that neither girl could make it out? I just feel that this whole thing would be a lot easier to understand if one girl had managed to survive.
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Mar 20, 2018 02:20
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Yeah I mean Dutch is crazy but some people speak it.
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Mar 20, 2018 02:23
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Yeah, I think we'd understand a lot of these stories a lot better if only everyone didn't die.
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Mar 20, 2018 02:29
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"Man invents concept of using words to communicate" Am I right, fellow ladies?
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Mar 20, 2018 02:35
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Pick posted:Am I right, fellow ladies? 
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Mar 20, 2018 03:14
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Oh man she's one of the few ones who still gives me the hella willies
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Mar 20, 2018 03:22
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Who is she?
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Mar 20, 2018 03:54
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RandomPauI posted:Who is she? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katherine_Knight 
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Mar 20, 2018 03:55
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RandomPauI posted:Who is she? A bad cook.
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Mar 20, 2018 04:07
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Holy poo poo. The first paragraph is crazy but the whole story is just... What?
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Mar 20, 2018 06:01
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This is horrifically hilarious. What in the world.
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Mar 20, 2018 06:35
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Solice Kirsk posted:A bad cook.  but lol
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Mar 20, 2018 11:48
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Pingiivi posted:Holy poo poo. The first paragraph is crazy but the whole story is just... What? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbavND3WqKE
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Mar 20, 2018 13:55
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MisterBibs posted:Despite being 53 minutes of beeps and boops, the morse code communications between Titanic and the other ships in the vacinity are legitimately scaring me the gently caress out. If it helps anyone's faith in humanity some, RMS Carpathia was not joking around when they morse'd that they were coming as hard as they could. Pretty much the oldest, smallest and kind of mediocre liner in that whole conversation and Carpathia did the technically impossible to make it there in time for anyone to be saved. But, speaking of ships sinking.. What about the Estonia for your next holiday cruise? quote:Survival that night was a very tight race, and savagely simple. People who started early and moved fast had some chance of winning. People who started late or hesitated for any reason had no chance at all. Action paid. Contemplation did not. The mere act of getting dressed was enough to condemn people to death, and although many of those who escaped to the water succumbed to the cold, most of the ultimate winners endured the ordeal completely naked or in their underwear. The survivors all seem to have grasped the nature of this race, the first stage of which involved getting outside to the Deck 7 promenade without delay. There was no God to turn to for mercy. There was no government to provide order. Civilization was ancient history, Europe a faint and faraway place. Inside the ship, as the heel increased, even the most primitive social organization, the human chain, crumbled apart. Love only slowed people down. A pitiless clock was running. The ocean was completely in control.
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Mar 20, 2018 15:24
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A Sea Story is one of the all-time great pieces of water-related non-fiction horror, along with https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/what-lies-beneath-mossdale-caving-disaster-794268.html
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Mar 20, 2018 15:54
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Speaking of shipwrecks, 75% of WWII u-boat sailors never made it home.
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Mar 20, 2018 16:30
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Bad Angus! Bad!
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coolusername posted:If it helps anyone's faith in humanity some, RMS Carpathia was not joking around when they morse'd that they were coming as hard as they could. Pretty much the oldest, smallest and kind of mediocre liner in that whole conversation and Carpathia did the technically impossible to make it there in time for anyone to be saved. That was an amazingly inspiring and strangely beautiful read.
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Mar 20, 2018 16:56
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Delivery McGee posted:Speaking of shipwrecks, 75% of WWII u-boat sailors never made it home. Ugh, that's like WW1 machine gunner life expectancy numbers.
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Mar 20, 2018 17:12
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Randall Jarrell posted:From my mother’s sleep I fell into the State,
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Mar 20, 2018 17:52
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coolusername posted:If it helps anyone's faith in humanity some, RMS Carpathia was not joking around when they morse'd that they were coming as hard as they could. Pretty much the oldest, smallest and kind of mediocre liner in that whole conversation and Carpathia did the technically impossible to make it there in time for anyone to be saved. drat, that's some fly-her-apart-then poo poo.  E: looked it up, and I know this is the opposite of the thread intent: Wikipedia posted:For their rescue work, the crew of Carpathiawere awarded medals by the survivors. Crew members were awarded bronze medals, officers silver, and Captain Rostron a silver cup and a gold medal, presented by Margaret Brown. Rostron was knighted by King George V, and was later a guest of President Taft at the White House, where he was presented with a Congressional Gold Medal, the highest honour the United States Congress could confer upon him.[ MisterBibs has a new favorite as of 18:12 on Mar 20, 2018 |
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Mar 20, 2018 18:08
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coolusername posted:If it helps anyone's faith in humanity some, RMS Carpathia was not joking around when they morse'd that they were coming as hard as they could. Pretty much the oldest, smallest and kind of mediocre liner in that whole conversation and Carpathia did the technically impossible to make it there in time for anyone to be saved.
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Mar 20, 2018 18:52
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in case it hasn't been posted before, here are pictures of a survivor (taken by another survivor) sitting on the underside of the capsized MV Estonia 
china bot has a new favorite as of 19:05 on Mar 20, 2018 |
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Mar 20, 2018 19:02
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It is very, very easy to get disoriented in the woods as has been stated already. I'll try to "quickly" tell of scary moment I once had. I was deep woods camping in Mammoth Cave National Park with my gf, and we walked about 5 miles into the woods to our beautiful, scenic campsite on top of a steep hill. Only 3 sides were pretty steep, and in one direction there was a wide river about a half mile away. We had just purchased these awesome portable water filters and were told by a ranger to just walk a direction (I forget so I'll call it North) to get to the river. It was about 2 hours before dark, when we set off North to get water at the river. We both had flashlights and (we thought) a good compass. We walk North down one of the steep sides, through some semithick off trail hiking. After 30 minutes of hiking while giving nervous glances at each other, we reach the water. It should not have taken 30 minutes to walk a drat half mile. We get a lot of water and start our trek back. It was about 5 minutes of walking before I started realizing the compass we had was garbage and giving poor readings. We are surrounded by thick woods with zero landmarks to see. All hills look the same and our only reference point is the sound of the river. I get my cell phone out, and try the compass app (lol 1). It gives crazy readings too and the cell reception is nearly zero. It was a long shot, but I try google maps (lol 2) and astoundingly it gives a vague map of the river and the approximate location that I knew our site was at based on the park map we were carrying. We had, at least, a starting point and a direction to try to follow. Google maps will not really update as we continue hiking due to poor reception, and it is getting pretty dark, as we have been hiking/getting water for about 1.5 hours. I am trying not to sound scared as the sounds of the woods at night gets louder and visibility becomes poor. Long story short, we become pretty mad at ourselves for being so woefully stupidly unprepared, when suddenly I see what looks like our hill. My vision is admittedly very good, and I shine the light to the top of the hill and see a small reflective part of our tent that we had assembled earlier. We make it to our campsite and enjoy the night. We rarely speak of that first night, but it was maybe the stupidest I have ever felt. It is easy to be overconfident and too comfortable in the woods.
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Mar 20, 2018 19:32
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Hiking at night, or in the late afternoon when any delay could push your trip into nighttime is...not the best situation to be in, to be sure. As someone who grew up surrounded by Daniel Boone National Forest, I can tell you that navigation very, very rapidly becomes much more difficult than you'd expect as familiar landmarks disappear as the lighting changes in the last couple of hours leading into sunset.
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Mar 20, 2018 19:49
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I remember a German journalist, Jutta Rabe, causing some controversy because she went all conspiracy nut on the sinking of the Estonia, claiming that it sank because of a bomb, which was then covered up because some Russian oligarch had been secretly transporting spy satellites onboard the ship or something. I think she got banned from getting anywhere close to the site after she tried diving to the wreck. She then made a movie about it with some thinly veiled self-insert mary-sue character uncovering the conspiracy. I never saw it but heard it was poo poo. pookel posted:Reconstruction of the sinking sequence here, fyi: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpRd7iiVgJM This is both incredibly engrossing and pants-shittingly terrifying. I remember going on a cruise both shortly before and after the Estonia sank, not too far from the location either. The first cruise was fun, on the second I spent a lot of time obsessively looking for the nearest exits and memorizing the quickest ways to get topside to the lifeboats. Didn't sleep a wink during the whole thing either. E: Oh, apparently the ship I was on before the sinking of Estonia was built by the same company as Estonia and had the exact same bow construction as Estonia did. That's a fun thing to know now. Stare-Out has a new favorite as of 20:39 on Mar 20, 2018 |
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Mar 20, 2018 20:04
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Jesus Christ. That is loving panic attack inducing.
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Mar 20, 2018 20:30
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I've been trying to convince my family on doing a cruise for Xmas this year, but now I'm rethinking it. Not because I'm afraid of the boat sinking, but because if anything goes wrong out there and it can escalate into a nightmare quickly.
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Mar 20, 2018 21:13
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