"The right thing to do is allow people who don't value

[Joe Guy]

their own lives to die"

When should victims of faulty judgment pay a 'negligent behavior' fee?

Crazy is, as crazy does. Keep that in mind as you go about doing whatever you do on this 4th of July.

How many times have your seen or read about some lug who takes a snowmobile out on the ice in the dying days of winter? Any fool would know the ice is not thick enough to hold the machine and its goofy driver, but there he goes on his merry way and soon thereafter, the first responders are on their not-so-merry way to save this knucklehead's life…at your expense.

Enter two lawmakers with a solution you might like.

One bill from Rep. Brandon Dillon (D-Grand Rapids) would allow local governments to slap a fee on the person being rescued if he or she has engaged in “negligent behaviors.”

The other by Rep. Rob Verheulen (R-Walker) restricts those governments from only charging for the medical supplies and the personnel time spent on the rescue. (What does that mean?)

What prompted all this was the recent flooding in the Grand Rapids area, when firefighters plucked a kayaker who fell from his boat and was clinging to a tree for dear life as the rapid floodwaters threatened to engulf him.

This suggested legislation is not a state mandate but gives the locals the option to impose these fees.

Of course there is room for interpretation about what constitutes "negligent behavior." Depending on the severity of the budget crunch in one local community compared to the next, you could declare jaywalking “negligent behavior” and if someone is hit doing that, would you sock it to ‘em with these charges?

Others might argue "negligent behavior" is like pornography - you know it when you see it. Either way this is a murky aspect of the proposals that probably will warrant some strict guidelines on what behavior should be punished.

But perhaps the legislation does not go far enough. In addition to charging them for the rescue, local governments should impose a tax on top of that.

Call it the “Dumb and Dumber” surcharge.

Any "amens" out there?

source

[rubato]

Iir from a wilderness medicine seminar Denali climbers are required to post up a huge fee in advance to pay for the frequent rescues, helicopters &c.

Yrs rubato

[Big RR]

Personally, I'd rather say--"If you get into trouble, you're on your own, we won't rescue you", but this could work as well.

[Gob]

Iir from a wilderness medicine seminar Denali climbers are required to post up a huge fee in advance to pay for the frequent rescues, helicopters &c.

Yrs rubato

Q: Do I have to pay anything at the time of registration?

A: Yes, climbers are required to pay the full permit fee when they submit the registration form. The current cost of a mountaineering permit is $350 US currency. Climbers that are 24 years old or younger at the time their expedition begins are eligible for a $250 youth fee. It is important to note that when you arrive to check in for your climb, a park entrance fee of $10 per person will be due. Interagency passes are accepted in lieu of the entrance fee. Passes must be presented at the time of check in along with identification.

A couple of observations;

a) This sort of registration seems way out of context for the mountaineering community.
b) It also seems to make mountaineering a government regulated activity.
c) $350 is a "huge fee"? (excessive affluence? )
d) Garaelb has done a winter ascent of Denali

[rubato]

There have been 16 winter ascents of Denali. I don't see his name on the list:

http://www.adn.com/2010/03/06/1171580/w ... inley.html


We went to an outdoors medicine conference in Fish Camp (near Yosemite where we went for 2 days after). It is one of those CME credit boondoggles where my wife gets paid time off and all costs subsidized. Among other classes &c there were talks given after dinner for the whole group including non-MD spouse. The person giving the talk on Denali was a paramedic who, in exchange for the ability to try to summit once a year, volunteers to do mountain rescues on his way up and back. He may have been speaking prospectively about the fees which would make sense for the timing:

http://www.nps.gov/dena/parknews/mounta ... se-fee.htm

He had video, slides, and audio from the prior year and gave a lot of biometric data. It sounded like 2 weeks of real hell. Resting O2 saturation was extremely low. Rescues involving helicopters were frequent events. Some for trauma but some for people whose bodies were simply shutting down from the low O2 partial pressure and low air pressure overall.

But if it costs $1,200 per climber to do the rescues they should just charge that much to everyone. (You'll have to use the link and actually read the article. A change, I know.)

As an aside, because of the numbers of people and the inevitable biological impact they are all required to take a 'mountain can' to shit in and then pack out to avoid having glaciers and snow fields dotted with human waste like raisins in rice pudding. The whole thing sounded like even less fun than spelunking. (There was a talk about an attempted rescue of someone who had slid head down into a crevice deep in a cave. They were unable to pull him back out before the weight of his body pressing down into a narrowing space killed him like a stone boa. But that reminds me of a great uncle who died 'tragically young' by falling head first into a well bore with similar consequences at 67. Most of his siblings lived 30 years longer than that including my lovely aunt Ida who is 101. )


Garelb has summited Denali in winter? Pull the other one Gertrude.

yrs,
rubato

[dales]

I was there when it was called Mt. McKinley, we stayed at the lodge. My sister and I ate hamburgers and drank milk shakes. It was 1968.

Did we value our lives?

I dunno, we were 2 dumb kids.

[Gob]

http://www.nps.gov/dena/parknews/mounta ... se-fee.htm

But if it costs $1,200 per climber to do the rescues they should just charge that much to everyone. (You'll have to use the link and actually read the article. A change, I know.)

So first rubato says;

Iir from a wilderness medicine seminar Denali climbers are required to post up a huge fee in advance to pay for the frequent rescues, helicopters &c.

Yrs rubato

To which I reply;

Q: Do I have to pay anything at the time of registration?

A: Yes, climbers are required to pay the full permit fee when they submit the registration form. The current cost of a mountaineering permit is $350 US currency. Climbers that are 24 years old or younger at the time their expedition begins are eligible for a $250 youth fee. It is important to note that when you arrive to check in for your climb, a park entrance fee of $10 per person will be due. Interagency passes are accepted in lieu of the entrance fee. Passes must be presented at the time of check in along with identification.

http://www.nps.gov/dena/planyourvisit/m ... eering.htm

His reply?

But if it costs $1,200 per climber to do the rescues they should just charge that much to everyone. (You'll have to use the link and actually read the article. A change, I know.)

The article states;

Currently, each climber of Mt. McKinley and Mt. Foraker pays a cost recovery special mountaineering use fee of $200.

So his huge" fee is actually less than I stated. What a moron.

Garelb has summited Denali in winter? Pull the other one Gertrude.

yrs,
rubato

That's what he told me, are you saying he lied?

[rubato]

Try reading? And thinking at the same time.?

My informant has actually climbed Denali. Yours is a liar.

Hatred has twisted and perverted your brain into insensibility.

I have no pity for you.




yrs,
rubato

[dales]

SMH

Hey rube, you forgot the $10 park entrance fee.

[Gob]

So, Rubes huge fee is $200, and Garaelb is a liar.

My claim;

d) Garaelb has done a winter ascent of Denali

There have been 16 winter ascents of Denali. I don't see his name on the list:

http://www.adn.com/2010/03/06/1171580/w ... inley.html

You list notes the summiteers, not those involved in the ascent.

Well done rube you excell yourself.

[dgs49]

In my neck of the woods we have rescuers searching now for the body of a guy who fell out of a whitewater rafting boat and somehow got caught underwater. Well, I guess "rescuers" is not apropos now. Can't hold his breath for 4 days.

Shall we bill his estate for the cost?

[dales]

Send the bill to:


The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500

[Econoline]

No, no, it was the Clintons who were responsible for Whitewater, not Obama. Get your facts straight.

[Scooter]

Where does it end, though? I can see a case being made where the person was engage in illegal acts. From the examples given, though, it sounds like they want to charge people even if the activities they were engaged in were perfectly legal. Are they going to charge for the costs to rescue someone who took a turn a bit too fast in their car and dove into a lake? Someone who fell off a ladder while painting their house because it wasn't well secured and they leaned over too far?

[Guinevere]

Where does it end, though? I can see a case being made where the person was engage in illegal acts. From the examples given, though, it sounds like they want to charge people even if the activities they were engaged in were perfectly legal. Are they going to charge for the costs to rescue someone who took a turn a bit too fast in their car and dove into a lake? Someone who fell off a ladder while painting their house because it wasn't well secured and they leaned over too far?

Exactly. One of the reasons we fund public rescue is because we know accidents happen all the time, and as a society we place a value on being able to assist in those kinds of situations. Do you really want first responders assessing whether the situation is because someone was negligent, or stupid, or if it was truly an accident, before they respond? Of course not.

And if we don't want to pay for the rescue of people who climb mountains, then don't allow them to climb mountains. Denali is in a National Park and Wilderness. I think an argument could be made that under the National Parks Act or the Wilderness Act, that humans aren't allowed to access the mountain itself -- then you've got no more issues with expensive rescues.

[Jarlaxle]

Or if they do something stupid...then they're on their own.

[Big RR]

Guin--while I agree, local governments often use the cost of a rescue as a pretext to regulate behavior. In my area we often have surfers who go into the ocean when noreasters are coming/present, to get the best surf. The towns/state/even federal government complain that it should be prohibited because of the cost and difficulties of a rescue ("Rescuers have to risk their lives to save these fools"), while the surfers say they are taking their own chances and that if they develop problems there is no need to rescue them, just let them drown. I'd rather see the latter approach than have the nanny state outlaw every action it does not like.

Certainly we do have public rescue groups is to rescue people, even if they are negligient, but certainly some limit on that respo0nsibility makes a lot of sense in light of the alternatives.

[oldr_n_wsr]

The Perfect Storm and The Deadliest Catch come to mind when arguing whether or not to fund rescues with tax dollars.

[Gob]

I don;'t know about over there, but most UK/Aus/NZ mountain rescue is done by volunteers, normally with the support of the forces, who use it for training purposes.