Unless you tend, like me, to be oblivious of popular culture, then you all know that the end of the world will be tomorrow, Friday, December 21, 2012. That is just a few, short hours from now. If, though, you are also like me, you are already making plans for this weekend. In particular, I will be spending Sunday afternoon hiking with my friends, Edie and Celeste, who have invited me out as a guest with their Meet Up group. Afterwards, the three of us, then, will quite likely head over to Mad Mex in Shadyside for a margarita or two … or three. This so-called Mayan Doomsday Prophecy has been a staple of discussion for about ten years now, probably since just after the humdrum conclusion of Y2K (which I find almost hard to recall now). Since then it has become a fixture of fear-mongering websites and blogs, books, even […]
Read more →As I regularly explain to clients during our wilderness survival courses, a lack of food in a survival situation is not necessarily a big deal. In fact, in such situations, food is a detriment as it is a stressor on the body. This is one reason why you’ll often hear survival instructors talk about the Rule of 3s — That is, one can go 3 minutes without air, 3 hours without shelter in harsh conditions, 3 days without water, and 3 weeks without food. The following news account, then, helps to underscore my point: Police in Manitoba ended their investigation today surrounding the events that caused a man to become lost and stranded in the wilderness for three weeks while hunting. Other than an apple, which he ate on Day One, he had no other food and lost 40 pounds. So, this story helps to illustrate why, of the Seven Survival […]
Read more →Do you remember Lexi DeForest? In case you don’t, she is the Colorado State University student who in late August made a video of herself while she laid waiting (painfully) for a Search and Rescue team in a remote section of Wyoming after severely breaking her ankle. For more information about what happened, please read our original post. Anyway, about a month after her accident, Lexi posted another video. In it, she provides more information about what caused her to fall and the effort involved afterwards to rescue her. Like the first one, this video offers us all many great lessons — Chief of which is the power of positive mental attitude. Happily, Lexi appears to be doing amazingly well. Check it out for yourself:
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For anyone who spends time in the outdoors, arguably, one of the most important items to consider having with you is a knife. It can certainly be handy as an all-around tool, but, more to the point, it plays a vital role in your survival pack. After all, preparation is a key component to best responding to an acute emergency situation and a knife can help you more easily do 1,001 things. So, spending a little time considering which knife can best serve your personal tastes, your chosen outdoor activity, your potential needs, while not burning a hole in your wallet, can pay off huge dividends. Let me, then, offer you a few thoughts which you might find helpful to get your started. A survival knife isn’t just used for cutting. In a survival situation, you will most likely also be using your knife to pry, pound, chop, dig, scrap, […]
Read more →While a terrific bunch of folks from Venture Outdoors met in Frick Park with instructors from True North last weekend to learn the basics of dealing with wilderness emergencies, a man in Orgeon started out on a day-hike. Unlike the VO group, however, this lone hiker apparently wasn’t as concerned about the possibility of unforeseen dangers, or being prepared for them. At one point, to stay warm, he actually lit his hat and backpack on fire! Earlier in the day, the hiker had set out along a trail (apparently with no map) near the Columbia River Gorge in Oregon that he once followed seven years earlier. Dressed only in jeans, a cotton tee-shirt, and a windbreaker jacket, he realized by 5:00 pm that he was lost. Not knowing the time of sunset, he was surprised by the onset of darkness and he had no flashlight. At 5:40 pm he contacted […]
Read more →This past summer on an EMS call, a paramedic taught me a simple, but important, lesson. We needed to move a patient from her bed to our stretcher, which we had momentarily left in the foyer, for transport to the hospital. However, since her bedroom was so tightly packed with furniture, and hallway access to it was also too tight and limited, we weren’t able to bring the stretcher the rest of the way to her bedside. I assumed, then, I would need to make a run to the ambulance to grab another piece of equipment that is specifically engineered to be used in such instances. However, the medic simply asked me to grab a sheet off the stretcher. A sheet? What good, I thought, could a sheet possibly do us now? When I handed it to him, he unfolded the sheet next to her, and gently helped her slide […]
Read more →Recently, I was reading a popular wilderness first-aid handbook that is used to trained thousands of Americans each year and one of the sections really bothered me. In its outline of how to control severe bleeding, it indicated that a tourniquet is used “only” as a last resort since it may “cause gangrene” and “may require surgical amputation of the limb.” The handbook also advises that in the event that a tourniquet must be used, that it should be loosened in “five minute” intervals to check if bleeding has stopped and to “allow some blood flow” to the affected limb. Sounds reasonable enough, right? Except that it isn’t accurate. According to much medical evidence, the reality is that a tourniquet, used by a trained wilderness first-aid provider, may, in fact, be the initial method of bleeding control in severe extremity bleeding. Much of what the medical community now knows about the […]
Read more →You want to spend more time in the Great Outdoors but you are more than a little nervous at the prospect of sharing the forest with vicious animals who are waiting to eat you? Well, all I can say is … Dude, relax! Trust me, you and your kids are not likely going to end up as an appetizer on the menu of a gastronomic bear (or, for that matter, any creature) the next time you decide to venture to the Laurel Highlands, Allegheny National Forest, or any of the other countless beautiful lands that this region has to offer. Don’t believe me? … I’ve got the statistics to prove it! Collective Fear I have found that the fear of “wild animals” is one of the biggest ones that people have when considering the prospect of spending time in woods. Which is unfortunate because, frankly, it is a fear based […]
Read more →In all of his wilderness survival courses, True North instructor, Erik, repeatedly stresses the paramount importance of PMA … Positive Mental Attitude. As he explains to his students, in a survival situation, it really doesn’t matter how much technical experience and training you have, or even what cool equipment you have in your backpack, that will help determine if you live or die. Rather, it is what is in your head and heart that most counts. A video-diary that Lexi Deforest, a Colorado college student, recently recorded when she became trapped in the mountains after her foot became detached from her leg in a climbing accident is an excellent example of the power of PMA. Thanks to Jake Griebe of SOWMAS, a Wisconsin based wilderness medicine and survival school, Erik just watched Lexi’s video which has since gone viral. We’ve provided a video link below for you to watch. But […]
Read more →In his wilderness survival courses at True North, Erik doesn’t teach about plants as a primary food source. Instead, he typically discusses a long list of what he calls the “myth of wild edibles.” This is a slight overstatement, Erik soon admits to students, but he makes it to emphasize two important points. Primarily, he wants them to begin re-thinking, and re-shaping, the world around them so that they are better prepared for an emergency situation, and not rely on preconceived notions from silly television shows or third-hand sources. Just as importantly, wild edibles are not Erik’s speciality, and he refuses to pretend that he is an expert where he is not. After all, our overarching focus at True North is all about giving students the information and training that will help keep them, and their loved ones, safe in the wilderness. So, it is our pleasure to introduce Jake […]
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