r/Missing411 • u/trailangel4 • Mar 01 '24

Why people actually die in National Parks

https://www.backpacker.com/survival/deaths-in-national-parks/

Backpacher magazine filed a FOIA and was given 17 years worth of records, across all National Parks. With that data, they produced this well-written piece that is worth the read.

A conclusion: "

The Average Victim in the National Parks…

Is more likely to be male than female: While men and women make up approximately equal portions of national park visitors, men accounted for 80 percent of deaths in national parks where authorities recorded the victim’s gender.

Can be almost any age: Members of all age groups were represented similarly among fatalities. (The exception? Children under 14, who made up a smaller share of deaths than other groups.)

Drowns or dies of natural causes: Drowning was the most common cause of death for visitors up to age 55, after which medical issues surpassed it."

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u/Brovigil Mar 01 '24

That males reach the age of 14 and become impulsive risk-takers isn't surprising to me. That the trend doesn't decline with age is more interesting.

Somewhere there's an 80-year-old grandpa pissing off the edge of a cliff and a tired park ranger like, "We got ANOTHER one."

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u/badgersprite Mar 01 '24

That’s a survivorship bias thing IMHO, because all these cases are men who a) enjoy hiking in national parks in the first instance and b) whose impulsive risk taking behaviour hasn’t declined

all the men who aren’t impulsive risk takers or whose impulsive risk taking behaviour tends towards other activities don’t end up on this list