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Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 12:48 pm
by Squirrel Girl
http://www.kpho.com/news/16338134/detail.html

PHOENIX -- A hiker who went off a South Mountain trail Monday was attacked by a swarm of bees before falling 200 feet into a ravine, Phoenix firefighters said.

The man, who is in his early 30s, was hiking alone around 5:30 p.m. when he left the trail to hike up a gully and was ambushed by hundreds of bees.

"He was waving his shirt and then he was actually just full of bees," said hiker Ken MacKenzie, who witnessed the incident.

When the hiker tried to escape the bees, he fell.

"He probably fell about 200 feet off of that trail and down into a ravine. He was all broken bones and cut up and tangled up in cholla cactus," said Capt. Lewis Jones of the Phoenix Fire Technical Team.
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Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 4:00 pm
by Ralph E. Powers
That's gotta hurt. Glad he survived. Hope he wasn't allergic. Wonders if he stepped on a nest or was simply too close. If these were also Africanized bees which are very aggressive.

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 4:19 pm
by Anonymous_Coward
This is the time of year in Arizona when the bees swarm while looking for a new place for a hive. This guy might have agitated them, or he might have been just minding his own business. I have been told that at this stage in the game, any bee you encounter in AZ can be assumed to be africanized.

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 6:56 pm
by Rick Brinkman
Poor guy.

Attacked by bees...fall down a 200' ravine...into the cactus...while it's 110 degrees.

If it wasn't so serious, it would sound like a cartoon.

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 8:33 pm
by ArCaver
:yikes: Damn! Talk about a bad day! :yikes:

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 9:24 pm
by Ralph E. Powers
in case anyone is curious here's a picture of the cactus species the guy fell into... :yikes:
Image

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 9:37 pm
by Squirrel Girl
Man, this is a really scary story. I mean I do a lot of outdoorsy things. I travel to AZ and go mountain biking solo. Crap, he's really lucky someone saw him and was able to call for help. This video says it took 2 hours before they got bee-protected rescuers to get him. Meanwhile, several folks had tried to reach him, but turned back due to the bees. I'm really surprised that the report said he'd been stung about a hundred times. I could see it being a lot more than that with such an angry swarm.

http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/ ... k0520.html

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 9:44 pm
by Squirrel Girl
Then there's also:
http://www.kltv.com/Global/story.asp?S=8353071&nav=1TjD

On Saturday (5/17) morning an Austin, Texas 81-year-old man was mowing his yard, then went inside his home and his wife heard a loud noise. She discovered him lying on the bathroom floor.

The man was pronounced dead at the scene when EMS arrived. Initially EMS suspected a heart attack and he was released to a funeral home. The funeral home began to inspect the body and discovered multiple bee stings.

The man's body was transported to the Travis County Medical Examiner's office for further examination by a doctor. An autopsy was performed and over 50 bee stings were discovered on the head, neck, and chest areas. The cause of death is being withheld pending further tests.

It has not been determined whether the bee stings caused or contributed to the man's death.

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 20, 2008 9:47 pm
by Squirrel Girl
And, a couple weeks before:
http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/236963

Border Patrol agents helped two illegal immigrants who had been attacked by a swarm of bees while crossing the Tohono O'odham Reservation get medical treatment Tuesday.

Agents encountered a man and a woman walking on Federal Route 19 south of Sells about 6:40 p.m., said Jesús Rodriguez, Border Patrol Tucson Sector spokesman. The pair said they had been attacked by a swarm of bees and needed treatment.

They were taken to the Sells Hospital. The Mexican woman, 40, had been stung more than 100 times and was held overnight at the hospital, he said. The man, 24, also Mexican, had been stung more than 45 times and was treated and released, then processed for a voluntary return to Mexico.

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: May 21, 2008 11:15 am
by Ralph E. Powers
Passing this along to another BBS a poster stated simply.

Some mornings it just doesn't pay to chew through the leather straps.

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: Jun 23, 2008 9:38 pm
by cavepig
I can understand, after having just one angry bee in the car in rush hour...

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: Jun 24, 2008 6:21 pm
by Wayne Harrison
On a happier note....

A Colorado woman hiking the Bavarian Alps fell 18 feet onto a rock ledge that was 4,100 feet off the valley floor She was injured badly enough that she couldn't climb up from the ledge and was trapped there for nearly three days. She saw a steel cable that lumberjacks use to winch trees down the mountain and attached her sports bra to the downhill side of the cable...thus alerting the people below.

Five helicopters and 80 rescue workers responded.... (I wonder if there'd have been that level of response if a guy attached a jockstrap to the cable?)

Story and video: http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/16 ... etail.html

On a not so happier note...

PostPosted: Jun 24, 2008 6:38 pm
by Squirrel Girl
A mountain lion attacked, killed and partially ate a New Mexico man, authorities said on Tuesday.

A search party found the body of Robert Nawojski, 55, in a wooded area near his mobile home in Pinos Altos, New Mexico, late last week, the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish said.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25354688/

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: Jun 26, 2008 3:45 pm
by hunter
Yeah, I saw that. Makes me a bit nervous since a couple of weeks ago I was walking down a trail near dusk following some after work climbing with two other people when we heard a stick snap. We looked up and a mountain lion was on the hillside watching us. It was interesting since 5 other people had walked that stretch of trail in the last half hour and the cat was where he could see the entire climbing area and had probably been watching us for a while...

James

Re: Hiker Falls 200 Feet After Bee Attack

PostPosted: Jun 26, 2008 8:24 pm
by Squirrel Girl
hunter wrote:Yeah, I saw that. Makes me a bit nervous since a couple of weeks ago I was walking down a trail near dusk following some after work climbing with two other people when we heard a stick snap. We looked up and a mountain lion was on the hillside watching us. It was interesting since 5 other people had walked that stretch of trail in the last half hour and the cat was where he could see the entire climbing area and had probably been watching us for a while...

James

Dale Pate was telling me how a group of visitors was waiting in the amphitheater at Carlsbad for the bats to fly and a deer walked over the entrance. Some tourist filmed it on their camcorders, got it home, viewed it, and discovered there was a mountain lion stalking the deer that no one had seen at the time!

Then there was the cougar that jumped out of the cave entrance that Jim Goodbar had been straddling (and the cougar went between his legs) when he gave a lecture to a group of people. :yikes: