< PREVIOUS ] [ 1993 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
Going outdoors for some recreation has been a cheap thrill, but that's changing. For instance, Mr. and Mrs. Frederick C. Howard of Lake Ariel, Penn., got a bill last year for $692,585.81 from the Idaho Department of Lands.
They were towing a Honda Civic behind their motor-home behemoth. The Honda's right rear tire blew out; sparking along the pavement, the bare rim ignited 6,200 acres.
Putting out the fires cost some serious money, and though other motorists honked, waved and blinked at the Howards, they refused to pull over. Instead, they just continued down the road as forest fires erupted behind them.
The obvious lesson is that one vehicle per driver is enough. There wouldn't be such fires if it were illegal to tow a car behind a motor home, and often as not, there's a boat or a trailer of motorcycles behind the boat. Just how much junk does anybody need on vacation, anyway?
But instead of solving the problem, the modern governmental response is to send bills when citizens cause expenses on public lands. Last week, the Park Service announced plans to charge mountaineers for rescues.
This isn't new. Rural counties have been sending search-and-rescue bills for years. Chaffee County even billed a hiker who wasn't lost.
A fellow from Abilene, Texas, led some Boy Scouts into the Sawatch Range to teach them winter survival skills. He vanished overnight; his worried scouts snowshoed out and called the sheriff. A week of searching -- risky searching in blizzards and subzero weather -- found no sign of him.
It turned out that, while searchers fought frostbite, the Texan had made his way to the ski lifts and was shacked up with a teen-aged girl while working under an assumed name as a dishwasher. The sheriff was a mite peeved, and so, a bill for search costs.
The Park Service points out that it doesn't have enough
money to do routine stuff, let alone engage helicopters to
pluck foolhardy sorts -- people who knowingly engage in
high-risk adventures
-- off the glaciers of Mt. Ranier
and Denali national parks.
There's an obvious solution: zone the national parks. Some areas would be patrolled so well that help would appear the moment you twisted an ankle. Others would operate under the policy that if you go in, it's up to you to get out -- no searches, no rescues, no help whatsoever.
Alas, that might have worked twenty years ago, but it won't work now. An upscale weekend experience-collector ventures into the High Risk Zone. He runs into trouble. Instead of using his wilderness skills, he pulls a cellular telephone out of his pack.
The 10 O'clock News carries emotional live telephone interviews with the stranded hiker who faces starvation or worse. The park superintendent has to explain on camera just why she's ignoring this terrible tragedy. Public pressure will mount, the rescue will commence, and that's the end of the High Risk Zone.
Too bad, because you should have the right to be a damn fool if you want to be. Instead, you'll get a rescue and a bill.
< PREVIOUS ] [ 1993 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >