Northeast Search and Rescue News

10/19/2026

When a college kid became hypothermic on a remote section of the Long Trail in the dead of night, Montgomery Fire Department Search and Rescue responded, sending a small team of rescuers. When they arrived on scene, they found the subject’s hiking group had put their wilderness survival skills into play and had taken some solid steps in the right direction, bundling them in a sleeping bag, sharing body heat and getting a fire underway. The professional rescuers worked to improve the subject’s situation until dawn, at which point they called for additional resources for an anticipated litter carry. We went in to assist but were happy to discover that the subject had re-gained enough body warmth to walk out under their own steam. Great work by the Montgomery crew.

Meanwhile as this unfolded, other Stowe Mountain Rescue team members were gently shivering at the side of the Trapps Mountain Marathon, on call in case of incident, while sc****ly clad athletes ran through the first snow squall of the season. It was impressive. Once again, we were poised ready to help, but our services weren’t needed.

The common theme here, other than our redundancy, is the cold. This time of year can be perilous because the valleys are deceptively warm during the day. Up at elevation it’s reliably cold, and darkness is falling earlier. There will be ice any day now. All hikers should err on the side of caution and carry more warm clothing than you think you’ll need. And throw a pair of microspikes in your pack so you’re not caught out in slick conditions. Keep up the calories and hydration – this is vital fuel for the furnace. Be on the watch for early signs of hypothermia (fumbling and confusion) and know that if someone gets to the point where they stop shivering and stop moving, they’re in dangerous territory. If you think you’re heading towards trouble, call 911. An early intervention by Search and Rescue can make a huge difference to the mission and the outcome.

10/12/2026

A group of researchers from University of California, Irvine investigated the link between SAR incidents, park visitation, and Twitter posts. Their conclusions could inform how hikers portray their own adventures—and view those of others—online. Read more at the link in comments.

10/06/2026

After covering over 4,400 square miles, search operations have been suspended for a missing medical flight off the Massachusetts coast.

Read more: https://www.khon2.com/news/national/search-suspended-for-6-aboard-medical-flight-that-went-missing-near-nantucket-coast-guard/?utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook_KHON2_News

10/06/2026

10/06/2026

From our sister publication, Adirondack Mountain News.

Happy shoulder season.

10/06/2026

With thousands of new hikers, climbers, and bikers heading into the wilderness, the people who rescue them are hitting a breaking point. The best way you can help? Sign up.

10/06/2026

This is a difficult story to read, and an equally difficult one to discuss.

Last week on Katahdin, 64-year-old Bert Goris was found incapacitated on the Hunt Trail during extremely challenging weather. Reports describe rain, strong winds and a wind chill near 20°F. He was having difficulty speaking and moving and had an apparent leg injury.

Two separate hikers stopped to help.

One reportedly left Goris with a tent, sleeping bag, emergency blanket and additional shelter. Another later encountered him and added another sleeping bag. Ultimately, both hikers continued down the mountain when the conditions began putting their own safety at risk.

Goris was later evacuated by rescuers and pronounced dead. His official cause of death remains under investigation.

It is tempting, especially knowing the outcome, to ask why someone didn’t simply stay with him until rescuers arrived.

But incidents like this are rarely that simple.

One of the fundamental principles of wilderness rescue is that we cannot create additional patients. Staying with an injured person in freezing rain, wind and deteriorating conditions may be exactly the right thing to do — until remaining there places the rescuer in serious danger as well.

Ideally, when we encounter someone who is injured, unable to move effectively, or showing signs of significant cold stress, we want to:

• Get emergency services/SAR activated as early as possible.
• Protect the person from wind and precipitation.
• Insulate them from the ground.
• Replace wet clothing or add dry insulation when possible.
• Use sleeping bags, emergency blankets, bivy sacks, tents or whatever shelter is available to slow further heat loss.
• Stay with them while help is coming — if we can do so without becoming another victim ourselves.

From the information released so far, the hikers who encountered Goris appear to have done a great deal with the equipment they had while also having to make an extraordinarily difficult decision about their own safety.

There is another lesson here for all of us who travel in the mountains: your emergency gear isn’t necessarily just for you.

That extra layer, emergency bivy, insulating pad, headlamp or sleeping bag may someday be what keeps another person alive while help is on the way.

Our thoughts are with Bert Goris’ family and everyone involved in this incident.

Be prepared. Look after one another. And remember that sometimes good decisions in the mountains can still have heartbreaking outcomes.

(Image from Mount Katahdin’s Hunt Trail. File/reference photo; not from this incident. Credit to ADVcollective)

09/30/2026

SAR School: Drainage trap

A drainage trap happens when a lost hiker follows a stream downhill, expecting it to lead out, and the terrain closes in instead.

"Follow a stream to civilization" is one of the oldest pieces of backcountry lore. It sounds logical: small streams feed larger ones, larger ones feed rivers, and towns grew up along rivers. It is the kind of simple rule a lost hiker reaches for under stress: memorable, plausible and dangerously incomplete.

Researchers have a name for this. Psychologist Kenneth Hill identified nine commonly observed reorientation strategies: random traveling, route traveling, direction traveling, route sampling, direction sampling, view enhancing, backtracking, using folk wisdom, and staying put. Folk wisdom covers any adage a lost person falls back on, and following water downhill is the classic case.

The pull is strong. When Hill surveyed Nova Scotia deer hunters about what they would do if lost, one cluster of answers centered on going downhill, typified by following a stream. He also observed that in Nova Scotia, the stream strategy tends to deliver the lost person to a remote swamp thick with bugs.

Robert Koester, whose *Lost Person Behavior* is the standard field reference for search planners, sees the same tendency in real searches. His hiker profile shows that lost hikers tend to travel downhill, and in his words, Following a straight line isn't as common as following a stream.

The advice persists because it sometimes works, usually in valleys with roads, farms or settlement along the water. In much of the Northeast backcountry, following water makes a bad situation worse.

A marked trail is built for travel. A stream follows gravity.

Trails here hold to ridges, benches and manageable grades, while streams take the steepest available line. A drainage can narrow into gorges, cascades and wet slab, choked with blowdown and dense spruce. It can end in a beaver flow, a wetland or roadless country. Wet boots and clothing speed hypothermia, even in summer. A hiker who descends the wrong side of a ridge can land in a different watershed, miles from the trailhead, with every step making the climb back harder.

That is why drainages matter to searchers. Because lost hikers often drift downhill or follow linear features, search planners commonly consider nearby drainages early in a search.

The lesson for hikers: Treat a stream as a landmark and keep it off your list of exit routes. When you realize you're lost, stop, call 911 while you have service, and wait in a spot where searchers can see you if you can reach one safely.

SAR School is a public-education series from Search and Rescue News. It offers general information and is no substitute for wilderness navigation training, first aid instruction or guidance from rangers and emergency responders. In an emergency, call 911.

09/27/2026

09/26/2026