Table of Contents
Foreword Jon Waterman v
Preface ix
Introduction 1
1 A Guide's Story: Magnet for Misadventure 37
2 A Carnegie Hero's Rescue on Lake Champlain 48
3 The Boy Scouts versus Wallface 57
4 The Crash of American Airlines Flight 166 68
5 Stranded: The Rescue of Maria Gersen 80
6 Grand Ambition: Two Men, Forty-Six High Peaks, Five Days, and only One Survivor 87
7 Of Ice and Men: Ice Climbers Avalanched Off Chapel Pond Slab 106
8 Marcy's Might: The Search for Steven Thomas 118
9 Running the Hudson River Gorge 126
10 Deadly Allure: Mount Colden's Trap Dike 137
11 Solo: A Long-Distance Hikers Final Days 147
12 Without a Trace: The Disappearance of Thomas Carleton 162
13 Blowdown! A Rogue Microburst Destroys Forest and Traps Hikers in the Wilderness 175
14 Mayday in the Sawtooth Mountains 188
15 Trapped: Rising Waters and No Safe Way Out 199
16 Avalanche! 210
17 An Unplanned Epic: The Third Worst Snowstorm in ADK History Surprises Two Pairs of Hikers 227
18 Lightning Strike 243
19 Dead Man Walking: The Search for Arthur Birchmeyer 254
20 Beacon of Controversy: One Canoeist, Two Rescues, and the Personal Locator Beacon that Made History 264
Epilogue: Lessons from the Backcountry 277
2020 Afterword 286
Time Line of Misadventures and Search and Rescues Covered in this Book 289
Bibliography 295
Acknowledgments 310
Index 312
About the Author 320
