PILOT HAD HUNCH: It led him to wife, kids

[RamboLiberal]

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/12/07/PILOT.TMP

A private helicopter pilot who says he spotted James Kim's footprints in the snow and then located Kim's wife and children alive in the southern Oregon mountains had a hunch the family had made a mistake common to motorists unfamiliar with the area.

That mistake was taking a wrong turn as Bear Camp Road climbs high into the mountains out of Grants Pass. Veer left, and the road continues to Gold Beach, the Kims' intended destination the night of Nov. 25. Veer right, and it's more than 15 miles down a logging road with no outlet.

John Rachor's hunch turned out to be right.

"When I heard the family was lost, immediately I had a pretty good idea where they were,'' Rachor, a helicopter pilot for 10 years, said Wednesday. "It's real easy to take a wrong turn where they did. A lot of people make that mistake.''

<snip>

He said he went up on his own looking for the Kims on Sunday after reading in the local newspaper that they had gone missing on the way to Gold Beach.

[Eric J in MN]

1. God forbid anyone should put up a sign to mark the dead end road. NT

NT

[Skittles]

2. and more signs ON the f***ing road

indicating THIS ROAD GOES FOR MILES THEN DEAD-ENDS! WTF is wrong when it is general knowledge people make that mistake a lot, yet steps are not made to correct it?

[Art_from_Ark]

9. Apparently the road had been gated,

but some numbskull vandalized the gate.

[cboy4]

3. A private pilot makes the discovery? Why wasn't the Oregon National

Guard more involved in the disappearance of these four people?

Isn't this the kind of work we need them to do?

Or are they all in Iraq? :wtf:

[RamboLiberal]

5. Reading this story I had the feeling the authorities were MIA

until the mom and kids were found. It was only then they seemed to get it in gear. And it wasn't like this story wasn't getting media attention.

[LWolf]

22. 15 of Oregon's National Guard will not be coming home from Iraq. n/t

[Perky]

23. brutal Segue

But the pilot is probably a member of the Civilian AIr Patrol which does this this type of work all the time

[Kingshakabobo]

28. I was wondering about that but I haven't seen it mentioned.

Have you? He DOES own 8 Burger Kings....he uses the chopper to shuttle between locations across the state........maybe to haul that creepy burger king psycho-mask guy around.

[SpiralHawk]

26. Our National Guard has been sent on a war of imperial oil conquest

So Commaner AWOL and his republicon oil cronies can reap massive profits.

Hardly anyone is left to guard America.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

39. I'd like to know that as well.

Shouldn't this road, even if it was a minor road, have been checked by somebody within a couple of days? Somebody on a snow mobile could have found them.

[rwenos]

4. Oregonians LIKE it Rural

The idea of signs to protect innocent Californians in Oregon would not occur to rural Oregonians. The locals KNOW that's a road to nowhere in the winter. Who the hell wants to pay for a sign to protect those stupid Californians?

This is an electorate that voted school bond issues down several times straight in the 1980's, even in the face of a (true) threat the schools would close if the bond failed. The schools in that county closed two weeks after the election, which took place in the 1st week of May.

People think Oregon is the bottle bill and environmentalism. It's really people allergic to taxes and Californians.

[Xithras]

40. Lol, allergic to Californians is sooo right.

Much of my family lives in Oregon, but I live in California. When I'm up there visiting, there is a huge and very noticeable difference in the way people treat me when I'm driving in my own car (with Cali plates), and when I'm driving my dad's truck (with Oregon plates). In my own car, I've been cut off, flipped off, and had people flat out refuse to help me or give me directions. In the truck, people tend to be FAR friendlier.

I've seriously given though to re-registering my cars using my dad's address, just to keep people from flipping me off.

[Kingshakabobo]

6. So, this guy nailed it on his first trip out??

How long were they missing before the air search began?

This guy is a hero in my book. He took it upon himself to search for these folks. So it wasn't the family's chopper that made the discovery after all.

[RamboLiberal]

8. Here's the Timeline - Missing for 9 Days when found

Nov. 25: They leave Portland for the Tu Tu Tun Lodge in Gold Beach and are seen eating dinner at a Roseburg restaurant before trying to drive through the mountains to the coast.


_ Nov. 26: Computer records show one of the Kims' cell phones receiving two text messages around 1:30 a.m.


_ Dec. 2: James Kim sets out on foot to try to find help for his stranded family. Police and family begin to search along highways and backroads between Interstate 5 and Gold Beach.


_ Dec. 4: Searchers find Kati Kim and their two children with the family car.


_ Dec. 5: Search and rescue personnel find clothes identified as those of James Kim, arranged in a pattern that may have been intended to give searchers clues to his whereabouts.


_ Dec. 6: The body of James Kim is found at the bottom of Big Windy Creek, half a mile from the Rogue River.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/12/06/state/n153159S85.DTL

[Kingshakabobo]

13. Thanks for that............

I'm still curious what the time differential was from....

..."hey, these folks are missing let's look for them" to Dec. 4th when the girls were found?

Was the search on-going for days? It seems as though that chopper pilot nailed it right away but he wasn't part of the official search. He said he read about it in the paper and went out to look on his own??????.....so it must have been on-going for a couple days prior to the mom and kid's rescue.


edit to add: Duh! It was in your post. Dec 2nd

[uppityperson]

7. 3 cheers for local knowledge. Common mistake means those dissing the Kims need to STOP

mistakes were made, these mistakes have been made by others. Glad this guy thought of this and went and did it and saved whom he did. RIP

[RamboLiberal]

10. I wonder as people who lived in the city if they had knowledge

of how dangerous these rural mountain roads can be.

After leaving the freeway, the Kims drove past a gas station, pizza parlor and coffee shop. On the way they passed at least three yellow signs warning that Bear Camp Road to Agnes and Gold Beach might be blocked by snowdrifts.

The road is paved but one-lane, originally built to haul logs out of the Siskiyou National Forest. It is now mostly used by rafters after descending the popular wild and scenic section of the Rogue River in summer. It is not plowed in the winter.

Driving higher through the snow in their all-wheel-drive silver Saab station wagon, the Kims came to a fork. A fourth yellow sign warned of snowdrifts blocking the way if they took the left fork to Gold Beach. They took the right fork, not knowing where it went.

Kati Kim told searchers they got stuck in snow once, managed to get turned around, then decided to stay put because they were low on gas. They stayed with the car more than a week, running the engine for heat and after the gas ran out huddling together inside for warmth.

James Kim left the car, and then the road, and bushwhacked five miles down the steep canyon, covering about eight miles through rough country, but ending up about a mile as the crow flies from the car. Some time later Kati Kim left a note in the car, then headed out herself shortly before she was found, Anderson said.

http://www.katu.com/news/local/4848006.html

[aaronbees]

11. On a katu report...

there was an interview with some locals who made it seem the road has always been a problem for people driving in.

[lapfog_1]

12. Link to the fatal decision intersection...

http://maps.google.com/?ie=UTF8&om=1&z=15&ll=42.574795,-123.748755&spn=0.016876,0.032873

[lumberjack_jeff]

34. It looks like it WOULD be very easy to get lost there. n/t

[ccorces1]

43. Agreed. They should really mark that.

[Duer 157099]

14. If I had to bet, I'd guess this was the spot where the road forked

http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=42.5749+N,+123.7505+W+&ie=UTF8&z=17&ll=42.574898,-123.750504&spn=0.005594,0.013561&t=k&om=1&iwloc=addr

Looks like exactly how the pilot describes. Wonder if it is.

[uppityperson]

15. Compare your map with #12's and no wonder they went wrong.

They went on the bigger road. (comparing road map vs truly larger road on satellite map)

[Duer 157099]

16. Yeah, That's the same place. The maze of roads is dizzying

I can totally see how they got lost. What's really sad is that at the end of the road they were on, just on the banks of the river not a mile from where he died, was a lodge. You can see it here:

http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=42.6570+N,+123.7338+W&ie=UTF8&z=18&ll=42.656999,-123.733799&spn=0.002793,0.006781&t=k&om=1

I think I understand the route he took, backtracking the road, then dropping east down into the ravine which was a branch of the Big Windy Creek, and he followed that toward the Rogue River.

Damn.

[Name removed]

17. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[malaise]

18. Why did it take so long for

search parties to look for them?

[WinkyDink]

19. Why did this family make the trip in the first place? Why did they then

ignore the warning signs about snowdrifts? Why not walk back the way they came?

I don't grasp a lot of this behavior.

[Berry Cool]

20. Why does anybody in this world do anything unwise, ever?

The judgmentalism being displayed here is amazing. But then again, it always is when there's a tragic ending. People rush to reassure themselves and everyone else that "I would never be stupid enough to do such a thing."

Maybe not. But some people are. Or they are not so much stupid as naive and inexperienced. Doesn't make what happens to them any less tragic.

They've already suffered the condemnation dealt out by nature. They hardly need the condemnation of mankind on top of it. Just my opinion.

[hayu_lol]

21. Air searches in bad weather...raining or snowing...are useless...

Like many people, these people apparently didnt check for info before starting out in this area. Local knowledge is everything in wilderness areas. They would have been better off staying in a Grants Pass motel for the night.

We humans are sometimes prone to starting something that looks ok, but changes rapidly, and just pushing on a 'bit further.' Sometimes nature bites back.

Signs and gates are frequently destroyed by hunters/hikers/vandals just to get into a familiar area they go all the time.

Results are frequently tragic as they were this time.

And yes, much of the Oregon Guard are in Iraq.

[karlrschneider]

29. I suspect James, given his background and job was overconfident in technology.

Machines and electronics are amazing things, but planes can't search in clouds and radio signals
don't penetrate mountains. So sad.

[treestar]

33. People don't want to think it will happen to them, but it could have

Fortunately for the rest of us, we can learn from his mistakes, while he learned the hard way. Condemning him as stupid helps people think it won't happen to them, but the better way to handle it might be to learn from it so that we can lessen the chances the like would happen to us.

From this I get generally that if you are from the city or a fairly urbanized area, don't mess with driving through mountains in winter, and if you must, tell people when you should return. The distances are much longer than the city person expects and the conditions far rougher.

The vastness of some parts of the US are not appreciated by surburban dwellers. And I say this as a suburb dweller, who has driven out west in summer and heard enough stories to know that driving in winter in those areas would be harder than I might think it would be just looking at a map.

[architect359]

35. Good God - damn fine post

After skimming through some of the vitrol above and in some of the other similar threads, thanks for writing that. That's awesome.

We all make mistakes and thankfully a huge majority of the time, these mistakes aren't life or death issues. Hell - we don't even know that they're mistakes until it's done and too late.

This family made had a momentary error of judgement. They dealt with it the best they could and in fact, admirably so. I certainly empathize and understand the desperation of actually having to go and find help. No communication. Its cold. You have kids, they're scared. Food gone. Days and nights have gone by. Tires all burnt. No freaking gas left to move or run the engine for heat. I mean, what the hell?

This is all hindsight. All so very much hindsight. Everyone with the should have, could have, might have comments - yeah, just meaningless arm chair quaterbacking. If any of you think that you can do better, well, bully for you. I just hope that I don't, or any of you, have to be in that situation to make those decisions.

OK - sorry. I just had to vent after reading some of the downright mean spirited posts. Again, thanks for writing that.

[LostinVA]

25. People often don't recognize the dangers of certain environments

And, how quickly something can change from benign to deadly.

I grew up in a very rural area in NJ ny the Delaware Bay. Every summer, loads of tourists from Philly would come and stay in the area to go fishing, crabbing, etc. They could be idiots. They would have a small amount if water/boat knowledge and think it translated into an environment that could change in heartbeat. They drowned, they put other boaters and Coast GUard personnel in danger for their overconfidence -- and sometimes arrogance.

What happened to this family is so tragic, and happens so many times when people venture into a wilderness area unprepared or without the proper knowledge. One small mistake can cost a life.

Mr. Kim's death is very unfortunate. I'm glad his family are okay.

[Jamastiene]

47. It is easy to get disoriented in extremely cold weather.

Sometimes, turning back the same way you came is not simple. The answer is really that simple.

[depakid]

24. That's experience talking

And it gives one intuition- Malcolm Gladwell wrote about that in the popular book "Blink," yet it's been researched by all sorts of serious scientists in many different fields.

The Pilot had it- and it made all the difference.

[Lars39]

27. What so many are overlooking in their haste to condemn the poor man

is that he was probably already suffering from dehydration and hypothermia *before* he set off for help.
You don't have mental acuity with either one, let alone both.

[lumberjack_jeff]

32. Weren't they stuck in snow?

That they survived 9 days indicates that lack of water wasn't a problem. That a 4 month old baby survived suggests that hypothermia (prior to setting out on foot) wasn't a problem.

Being stuck physically and culturally unprepared in the emergency situation, with two small kids probably affected his mental acuity to a greater degree.

[laundry_queen]

37. Interesting tidbit -

When it comes to hypothermia, women and children are far more likely to fare well then men are. Because of the extra body fat, hypothermia is one thing women and children are more likely to survive than a strong, lean man. He was probably in worse shape than they were when he set off for help...

[uppityperson]

42. some more info on hypothermia, including conditions leading to it.

Lack of food, lack of body fat, dehydration (even if wife and child survived doesn't mean they weren't dehydrated, fatigue, exhaustion, also (not listed here but elsewhere) some medical conditions.

http://www.princeton.edu/~oa/safety/hypocold.shtml

1. Hypothermia - "a decrease in the core body temperature to a level at which normal muscular and cerebral functions are impaired." - Medicine for Mountaineering

2. Conditions Leading to Hypothermia

* Cold temperatures
* Improper clothing and equipment
* Wetness
* Fatigue, exhaustion
* Dehydration
* Poor food intake
* No knowledge of hypothermia
* Alcohol intake - causes vasodilation leading to increased heat loss

3. What are "hypothermia" temperatures

* Below freezing
* 40 degrees - Ex. Shenandoahs, wind and rain
* 60 degrees - Ex. Rayanna and hurricane
* Any temperature less than 98.6 degrees can be linked to hypothermia (ex. hypothermia in the elderly in cold houses) or peripheral circulation problems such as trench foot and frostbite.

[Jennicut]

30. The Pilot said lots of people make the same mistake

of going down that road in Oregon so I can understand why the family made that mistake as well, it was easy do to. My heart goes out to the family and I hope nothing like that ever happens to me or anyone I love. Does anyone here watch "I Shouldn't Be Alive" on Discovery Channel? Its a really good series off anf on on Friday nights about people who go into nature for mountain climbing or kayaking or a anything like that and end up getting caught in a situation where they have to fight for their lives. All the people on there make mistakes, some are experienced and some are not. Its remarkable that these people survive at all as nature can be so cruel. Some of them are experienced conservationists and mountain climbers. I think people who are so unsympathetic to this family need to be around people more. How can someone be so unfeeling? People make mistakes all the time and I'm sure Mrs. Kim will be rethinking how they did this the rest of her life so noone needs to go on and on about how "dumb" the family was.

[magellan]

36. Very nice post, Jennicut

Thank you for saying it so well. It's easy to judge others based on our own knowledge and experience. Compassion requires more of us. I wonder if those judging them would feel so good about themselves after saying to Mrs. Kim's face, "I'm sorry you lost your husband but what you did was stupid."

The Kims deserve our sympathy without the "buts". They paid a very high price for their mistake.

Welcome to DU. :hi:

[lumberjack_jeff]

31. To a degree, I think that people are missing the point.

It's tragic that James Kim died, and given the road, the weather, their lack of local knowledge and the fact that they had been stranded for a full week in the car when he set off on foot it's not all that surprising.

That said, I think there is something to be said for the view that todays civilized people are less capable of solving problems than our forebears.

Even absent any emergency preparation prior to setting out on the trip (flares, chains, tools, winter clothing, food, water, etc) The car that carried the family was equipped with a tank of highly volatile fuel, a cigarette lighter, and was surrounded by a forest which had ample nearby debris for creating a big, smoky fire.

I don't see these observations as intended to ridicule Mr or Mrs Kim, I think they are an indictment on our civilized ability to solve our problems with the tools at hand. Cellphones and credit cards are seen as all-purpose tools. An earthquake in a populated area will cause much greater tragedy than is otherwise necessary because of this lack of thinking skill.

Hopefully, this will help someone in the future avoid a similar fate.

(An interesting aside, I had to edit this message to remove all the male pronouns that were in my first draft. It's interesting how human nature causes people to attribute all decisionmaking to dad in an emergency situation - especially if it goes badly. What would the comparatively equality-minded "we" be saying if she'd been found dead after her vain attempt to rescue the family?)

[symbolman]

38. Totally agree

like I'd mentioned, machines FAIL, especially under bad weather conditions, and I agree that people don't have the problem solving skills that some of us older folks do - and I don't have the skills that my Uncles and grandfather did..

they are trickling away from us and it's scary sometimes to know that people don't GET IT..

Up in Alaska, the AK folks ALL HELP each other, they teach each other tricks and tips.

As a matter of fact, there was, and may still be a law up there, where if they can prove that YOU passed someone walking on the road below zero, without assisting them, then YOU can be held for manslaughter.

I've seen women on the ways to parties in High Heels dancing around freezing at 50 below, Burning the Seats from their car to stay ALIVE.

With all that gas and all the wood there, he should have been able to make a BLAZE that could be seen for MILES. Rangers investigate that stuff, do the whole forrest doesn't burn down, hence you get rescued.

But it looks like someone said they "burned their tires"? Is that true? because THAT would send up a hella of smoke signal.

Thanks for making what I was inferring so clear.

[BlackVelvet04]

41. In fairness

I have to say this country girl who knows how to survive in the desert and the mountains doesn't have a clue about dealing with big city life. The suburbs drove me crazy and New York City was like a jungle to me. I would go nuts in a week if I had to deal with a big city or go back to the suburbs.

We each have a point of reference we deal from and that seldom equips us well for conditions opposite to what we are used to.

[symbolman]

44. Yep

I have no use for cities, can't stand seeing those Street People all FREEZING or Starving to death in the midst of so much Plenty, blows my mind.. the suburbs are totally status quo folks, if you vary or disagree, they NEED to get EVEN with you.. if you aren't a pod person you get screeched at until you fall in line..

To anyone who's ever been "un caged" it's wierd to HAVE to BE a certain way, instead of yourself, live and let live..

And I agree that it's harder to survive in the CITY than in nature, where there's heat and food just about everywhere :)

[Tsiyu]

45. James Kim: 1971-2006

http://news.com.com/2009-12-6141617.html?tag=cnetfd.ld1


*snip*

"Anyone that knows James will tell you that he would do anything to protect his family," said Jason Zemlicka, a friend of 10 years and former co-worker. "I know him, and he must have believed he was going to get somewhere."

Friends and co-workers now mourn Kim but say they will celebrate his success at helping to accomplish his most important goal during that desperate week in the woods: the rescue of his wife, Kati Kim, and the couple's two daughters, Penelope, 4, and Sabine, seven months.

"I have had the privilege of knowing James since our days together at TechTV," said Joe Gillespie, executive vice president at CNET Networks and a former co-worker of Kim's while the two were at the now-defunct cable channel. "And while I have many fond memories, I will honor forever what he set out to do last Saturday. He is true a hero to all here at CNET."

Indeed, he was praised for his resourcefulness by authorities in Grants Pass, Ore., who organized the search and described his efforts as "superhuman." According to interviews with Kim's in-laws, he lifted his family's spirits by acting as if they were all just on a campout.

*snip*


To all those who feel the need to insult this man, I can only say this: your perfection is depressing to the rest of us. And, no, I really don't want to be as perfect as you all are. It would suck to be any of you, actually. You are cold-hearted humans.

To those who appropriately mourn this man's passing, and forgive him for being less than perfect, thanks for being you.

[uppityperson]

46. Spotting Jim's footprints 5 miles from car led pilot to wife and child.He saved them.

after all the talk, the arguing about "should Jim have stayed with the car", this bit seems to have been missed.

The footprints he had spotted were 5 miles from the Kims' stranded Saab station wagon, about where James Kim turned into a creek ravine where his body eventually was found.

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/12/07/PILOT.TMP

Seems like Jim saved them and sacrificed his own life in doing so.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

48. My own experience with snowy roads in Oregon

One May day in the mid 1980s, some friends and I took a trip over the Cascades to the towns of Bend and Sisters on the east side.

On the way, we stopped off at a ski resort and marveled at the sight of people skiing in shorts and t-shirts. That's how warm it was.

When we came to a fork in the road on the way back, we looked at the map, saw that it was an alternate route over the mountains, and decided to try it. Never mind that it said,"Road closed due to snow." It was seventy degrees out, and there wasn't a hint of snow. All the trees had full leaves.

So we set out on the alternate road and drove along about ten miles, climbing higher through the woods all the time, without incident. We assumed that the highway department had simply forgotten to take down the warning sign at the end of winter.

All of a sudden, we rounded a curve, and there was literally a wall of snow about six feet high blocking the road. We got out of the car to look at it and found that the air was noticeably colder than it was farther down.

We realized that we should have believed the sign.

[hootinholler]

49. Great story what a photo op. n/t