QUOTE(ddd35 @ Feb 20 2007, 01:27 PM)
RANT
Im really tired of watching the news or reading th paper and seeing were some mountain climber as gone out with a blizzard coming and climbed half way up the side of a mountian that they shouldnt be on anyway then there familys expect the world to stop and evryone go rescue them once there lost or trapped up there , its pretty simple if ya dont go ya dont have the chance of getting lost or worse yet dyeing , its my thought if you go , you go at your own risk and heaven help ya , its kinda like swimming with sharks , you get what ya ask for ...
In some ways I can agree with what you're saying but in some ways not.
If a person knowingly goes out when conditions are really bad or going to be really bad, they gotta kinda expect what they get. But I think a lot of these guys(and girls) are professionals who weigh the benefits against the risks and
most aren't going to take unreasonable risk. Now you might think wandering up the side of a mountain IS unreasonable risk but to compound that with a blizzard is pretty foolhardy.
Sometimes these storm systems just whip up out of nowhere and are very unpredicatble. So does that means that people shouldn't try and conquer these things, whether it be a mountain or crossing Arctic ice sheets. I say Hell no! A lot of these people are very inspirational and passionate about what they do and I think it is really cool when you can just step back from your usual 9-5 or whatever life that most of us lead and do something really incredible.
Now if someone does this without properly preparing they are asking for trouble and I guess these types of people exist.
But other than that, I don't feel especially angry with having to rescue adveturers. I think most of us can remember a time when maybe we drove down that highway when the conditions weren't great to get some stuff we really didn't need from the store. I think if we hit the ditch we'd still expect someone to come help us out.
And many of these groups pay independent support teams to be ready to dispatch in case of any type of emergency.