What happened to this California family?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

3L (that's roughly 3 quarts for the metric impaired) of water. That's not enough for the two adults and a dog. Dogs are terribly inefficient at drinking.

The sheriff knows what the family had with them. That hasn't been disclosed. There's a lot of information that the public doesn't have. It's something to keep in mind while speculating.

Right! I keep hearing that they only had 3L of water. Does anyone have an actual cite for that? All I've heard - from the early articles - were that the family was 'well prepared' for the hike, and that they had some water left in the bladder style water container. The latter was mentioned in the context of sending that remaining water out for testing.

People are ASSUMING that 1) the bladder is a 3L camelback, and 2) that there was no other water brought along. I've never seen a statement from law enforcement that the bladder was their ONLY water - just that they had one, and it had some water left in it. There may have been several other large containers, probably empty (because they drank it all). We truly don't know what they had with them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

Making a bad decision doesn't make a person bad. ALL people make bad decisions at various points in their lives, it's just that circumstances sometimes exacerbate bad decisions into tragic outcomes. If you truly believe that only bad people make bad decisions or bad decisions imply a person is bad, I encourage you to work on shifting your mindset as that can really negatively affect your life and relationships.

Absolutely this. Not bad parents, just parents who made a couple of mistakes with tragic consequences due to the circumstances.

We have all made mistakes, but for most of us there are no consequences or they are very minor.

[Anonymous]

They don't have the toxicology reports yet so they haven't ruled out an environmental hazard. That also means they haven't affirmatively confirmed an environmental hazard caused (or contributed to) the deaths. THEY DON'T KNOW so closed the trail in an abundance of caution.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

3L (that's roughly 3 quarts for the metric impaired) of water. That's not enough for the two adults and a dog. Dogs are terribly inefficient at drinking.

The sheriff knows what the family had with them. That hasn't been disclosed. There's a lot of information that the public doesn't have. It's something to keep in mind while speculating.

Right! I keep hearing that they only had 3L of water. Does anyone have an actual cite for that? All I've heard - from the early articles - were that the family was 'well prepared' for the hike, and that they had some water left in the bladder style water container. The latter was mentioned in the context of sending that remaining water out for testing.

People are ASSUMING that 1) the bladder is a 3L camelback, and 2) that there was no other water brought along. I've never seen a statement from law enforcement that the bladder was their ONLY water - just that they had one, and it had some water left in it. There may have been several other large containers, probably empty (because they drank it all). We truly don't know what they had with them.

This is almost irrelevant as they likely died of heatstroke rather than dehydration. If they had enough cold water to submerge in then they may have survived.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

Making a bad decision doesn't make a person bad. ALL people make bad decisions at various points in their lives, it's just that circumstances sometimes exacerbate bad decisions into tragic outcomes. If you truly believe that only bad people make bad decisions or bad decisions imply a person is bad, I encourage you to work on shifting your mindset as that can really negatively affect your life and relationships.

The big question is...is it a bad decision to make baseless assumptions about a family only to criticize them? Or maybe that makes you a bad person?

[Anonymous]

The theories on this thread are now running in circles because posters are not reading prior posts. And how the heck did gluten free donuts enter the mix? I don’t have the will or fortitude to sift through for the answer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

3L (that's roughly 3 quarts for the metric impaired) of water. That's not enough for the two adults and a dog. Dogs are terribly inefficient at drinking.

The sheriff knows what the family had with them. That hasn't been disclosed. There's a lot of information that the public doesn't have. It's something to keep in mind while speculating.

Right! I keep hearing that they only had 3L of water. Does anyone have an actual cite for that? All I've heard - from the early articles - were that the family was 'well prepared' for the hike, and that they had some water left in the bladder style water container. The latter was mentioned in the context of sending that remaining water out for testing.

People are ASSUMING that 1) the bladder is a 3L camelback, and 2) that there was no other water brought along. I've never seen a statement from law enforcement that the bladder was their ONLY water - just that they had one, and it had some water left in it. There may have been several other large containers, probably empty (because they drank it all). We truly don't know what they had with them.

Because people see 3L and think, "That's a lot of water." No, it really isn't for hiking 8 miles, if that is indeed the path they took. The Camelback (or whatever brand it was) was on the husband along with the baby, so there is a finite amount it could hold. While the sheriff said they had water left, they never said how much. Enough to test apparently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

They were not well prepared evidenced by the fact that they attempted a very strenuous trail with no shade, during extreme weather, with a baby and a dog.

Their bodies lay on the trail for two days. Nobody who has any sort of experience of hiking in this area, or has prepared by researching the conditions, was going anywhere near that trail.

You are making a lot of assumptions here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

3L (that's roughly 3 quarts for the metric impaired) of water. That's not enough for the two adults and a dog. Dogs are terribly inefficient at drinking.

The sheriff knows what the family had with them. That hasn't been disclosed. There's a lot of information that the public doesn't have. It's something to keep in mind while speculating.

Right! I keep hearing that they only had 3L of water. Does anyone have an actual cite for that? All I've heard - from the early articles - were that the family was 'well prepared' for the hike, and that they had some water left in the bladder style water container. The latter was mentioned in the context of sending that remaining water out for testing.

People are ASSUMING that 1) the bladder is a 3L camelback, and 2) that there was no other water brought along. I've never seen a statement from law enforcement that the bladder was their ONLY water - just that they had one, and it had some water left in it. There may have been several other large containers, probably empty (because they drank it all). We truly don't know what they had with them.

This is almost irrelevant as they likely died of heatstroke rather than dehydration. If they had enough cold water to submerge in then they may have survived.

My understanding is that the humidity was low, so you could get some beneift from evaporative cooling. Getting your temperature down would keep you lucid which seems important.

[Anonymous]

Why are people fixated on the water? Nobody is saying they died of dehydration. Heat stroke is about core body temperature - independent of how much water they did or did not drink.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

So many assumptions. Some very wrong.

In my post above? Very few assumptions really except for the unforeseen event. And there may not even have been an unforeseen event if they just overestimated there abilities by too much.

Please cite data for:
inexperienced hikers
overestimated abilities
poor planning
temperatures for their planned hike

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The theories on this thread are now running in circles because posters are not reading prior posts. And how the heck did gluten free donuts enter the mix? I don’t have the will or fortitude to sift through for the answer.

There was a long tangent on WS (since deleted) making assumptions about Ellen based on her donut buying habits, which resulted in a moderator post that was unintentionally kind of funny.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

3L (that's roughly 3 quarts for the metric impaired) of water. That's not enough for the two adults and a dog. Dogs are terribly inefficient at drinking.

The sheriff knows what the family had with them. That hasn't been disclosed. There's a lot of information that the public doesn't have. It's something to keep in mind while speculating.

Especially if you are trying to criticize this family.

Don't criticize if you don't have the facts (newsflash: you don't).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

The sheriff said that the family was well prepared for the hike. You just can't accept that something happened to this family, that they weren't bad parents making bad decisions that you disapprove of.

They were not well prepared evidenced by the fact that they attempted a very strenuous trail with no shade, during extreme weather, with a baby and a dog.

Their bodies lay on the trail for two days. Nobody who has any sort of experience of hiking in this area, or has prepared by researching the conditions, was going anywhere near that trail.

You are making a lot of assumptions here.

You have totally lost the plot over this thread and have now taken to insulting other posters. Let’s wait and see what the investigations conclude. But for now I am out.

And I would suggest you think carefully about how you speak to others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have read a lot about this case and it seems to me that a bunch of circumstances have come together with tragic results.

Inexperienced hikers who overestimated their abilities and perhaps did not plan properly, brutal temperatures, perhaps something unforeseen like taking the wrong trail or the dog not being able to walk and needing to carried. And from then on things went south rapidly as often happens in similar cases.

The trail being closed certainly complicates things but it may really just be to keep people from snooping around and possibly getting into trouble themselves.

So many assumptions. Some very wrong.

In my post above? Very few assumptions really except for the unforeseen event. And there may not even have been an unforeseen event if they just overestimated there abilities by too much.

Please cite data for:
inexperienced hikers
overestimated abilities
poor planning
temperatures for their planned hike

This evidence is all readily available. Go read the Websleuths thread.