BAXTER STATE PARK, Maine — A Massachusetts hiker’s military training, perseverance and strength were credited Friday with her surviving 1½ days on the Mount Katahdin tablelands.
Baxter State Park rangers had already begun searching for Sarah Pierson, 49, of Spencer, Mass., when she emerged from the thick woods at Abol Campground on Thursday afternoon with only minor injuries. Pierson was treated and released from Millinocket Regional Hospital late that night, Park Director Jensen Bissell said.
Pierson began heading south on the Appalachian Trail at Mount Katahdin on Wednesday armed with a headlamp. She reached the mountain peak sometime Wednesday night but lost her way and traveled several miles over tableland trails before leaving the trails near boulders in a gully west of the Abol Trail, Bissell said.
Pierson continued hiking down what Bissell called “difficult and steep terrain” the rest of Wednesday night and most of the next day before finding the campground and some rangers late Thursday afternoon, Bissell said.
By then, six rangers and a fixed-wing aircraft piloted by Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife workers had begun searching for Pierson. They became aware that she was missing early Thursday, Bissell said.
It was unknown whether Pierson had a park map, warm clothes, GPS system, extra food or a charged cellular telephone for emergency use, which park officials generally recommend.
Bissell credited Pierson for having the headlamp. It allowed her to keep hiking overnight.
“Park Rangers strongly recommend that all hikers recognize that their true destination for the day is a safe return to their car or campsite at the end of the day,” Bissell said in a statement. “Hikers should begin Katahdin hikes as early as possible and each hiking plan should include a predetermined turn-around time that ensures a safe return to roadside.”
For hiking information go to baxterstateparkauthority.com, or call 731-5140.
“A Massachusetts woman beginning a southbound hike on the Appalachian Trail lost her way…”
If her intent was to be an AT Thru Hiker, she should reconsider her plan.
She could be a section hiker ?
Wow, it’s gonna be a long walk for her.
Drop her off at the New Hampshire border.
Glad she’s OK but starting up Katahdin late in the day was not a smart move. If she is going to keep making decisions like this maybe she should give up now before she isn’t so lucky.
Mount Katahdin tablelands. ?wouldn’t it beMount Katahdin Timberlands ?
Nope, the area she was in is known as the Tablelands. It is the flat plateau area you need to cross before you reach the summit.
I climbed twice a century ago, up to Pamola, across Knife Edge to a plain (big flat area) to Baxter Peak. Am I even warm with my idea of what the “tablelands’ are? I remember leaving Roaring Brook and coming down from Chimney back to Roaring 13(?) hours later. Any landmarks I might remember to give me perspective? Tanx!
If you went up to Pamola, across Knife Edge to the summit and come back through Chimney Pond, you wouldn’t have hiked on the Tablelands. Although, you would have, if it was a clear day, had a great view of them from the summit.
There are 2 trails that take you across the Tablelands…. the Abol and Hunt trails, which leave from Abol Stream Campground and Katahdin Stream campgrounds respectively.
Thanx!
people are relying upon auto correct too much these days
Gads!
She’s lucky to be alive.
You really can’t fix stupid.
Why the drama? “Survived” one-and-a-half days? Of getting eaten by a bear? Of 40-degree temperatures? If she was hiking the AT, I’m sure she had food and water…
“A Massachusetts hiker’s military training, perseverance and strength were credited Friday with her surviving 1½ days on the Mount Katahdin tablelands.” … really? that great military training couldn’t keep her from getting lost on a marked trail? LOL
If this is what our troops are learning from “TRAINING” these days, it’s no wonder there are so many military funerals………… it’s a sad day………
Maybe her training was for a desert? I’ll give her credit for getting out, although she was silly enough to climb with only a headlite as the story suggests.
I don’t think it’s right to criticize her because we don’t know why they decided to start looking for her. It seems like she made it back on her own. I wonder if she had any reason to believe she would be missed so soon. Maybe she did have a charged cell phone with her but she wasn’t going to turn it on unless she needed to call for help.
I wouldn’t criticize her either. We have no idea who may have reported her. If she truly was that unprepared, then I doubt she told anybody her return time. She may be saying “Who pushed the panic button? Think I couldn’t find my way outa THAT? ” The story is woefully lacking in details and I doubt she went up there with nothing. We don’t no crap from this story. :)
I was very good with a topo map and compass by the time I was 10. I think some people here are just talking trash about something they have never actually experienced. I was a young adult when the fitness boom started taking off. People who won’t go more than a few feet away from public roads call themselves “avid hikers”. I call them “potential road kill”. I think it’s safer to be in the woods.
Lots of folks don’t understand how easy it is to get “turned around” in the woods. Sounds like she did and paniced some. “Armed with a headlamp” isn’t the best way to go into the woods on any trail, and if you find you strayed from the trail, better off to sit down and think things though for a while before going bushwhacking on yor own unless you’ve got a compass and a map and know how to use them.
I went down to Boston for a visit and survived for 1 1/2 days before emerging from that jungle and the BDN didn’t cover it!!