Backcountry.com: The Goat

Family of Man Killed at Winter Park Sues

Michael Frank, Adventure Journal — Fri, 25 May 2012 13:00:30 PDT

Christopher Norris died in January at Winter Park Resort after being caught in an avalanche. Now his family is suing the mountain in a wrongful death claim. The slide occurred within bounds and the suit alleges that mountain managers should have known about the danger. Winter Park Resort officials “had the duty to close those areas within its boundary which it knew or should have known posed an avalanche hazard to skiers under the conditions existing on January 22, 2012,” according to the complaint. But the case will hinge on what one of the attorneys representing Norris’s wife has said, which is that hitting a rock or a tree is an inherent risk to resort skiing — but an in-bounds avalanche is not. Via Aspen Times.

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Scary Utah Mountain Man Identified — Still Wanted

Michael Frank, Adventure Journal — Fri, 25 May 2012 11:00:09 PDT

Troy James Knapp. That’s the name of a mysterious criminal still at large in the shadow of Zion National Park. The FBI and Utah authorities want Knapp in connection with several cabin and home break-ins, and for weapons charges. Knapp fled felony charges in California nearly a decade ago and has been living on the run since and, the cops believe, has been breaking into cabins and homes in southern Utah for at least five years. While he’s never been connected to a crime more violent than assault, police fear he’s a ticking time bomb. He’s left cabins riddled with bullet holes, defaced religious icons, and wrote taunting notes for cabin owners and lawmen. “Hey Sheriff … Gonna put you in the ground!” one note said, according to court records. Via CBS News.

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Bike Across the Country, Build Houses on the Way

Rocky Thompson — Fri, 25 May 2012 10:00:33 PDT

Burned out on your office job and looking for a way to make a difference? Quit. You can join up with the Bike & Build trip from South Carolina to Santa Cruz. The 80-day trip includes several stops to build homes for the needy along the way. I’m sure prospective employers will look upon your journey with admiration when you’re ready to rejoin the workforce.

via Gear Junkie

A Tale of Two Mountain Lions in L.A. Area

Steve Casimiro, Adventure Journal — Fri, 25 May 2012 09:00:30 PDT

A few days ago a mountain lion in downtown Santa Monica had to be euthanized by animal control. The adolescent cat was spotted on the streets at six in the morning and while authorities managed to hit the animal with a tranquilizer, the cat attempted to charge out of the courtyard where officers were hoping to contain it, and unfortunately had no choice but to shoot it to prevent public harm. Meanwhile, just a few miles east of Santa Monica, biologists have collared and GPS tagged a lion whose territory includes L.A.’s Griffith Park. It’s not the first time a lion’s lived in the park and authorities don’t anticipate a danger. Since 1890 there have been 16 lion attacks in the L.A. area, four of them fatal. Via NY Daily News.

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$10,000 Reward Offered for Shooter of Grizzly and Nursing Cub

Rocky Thompson — Fri, 25 May 2012 08:00:26 PDT

Photo by Traveler100

Officials are offering a $10k reward for information leading to the arrest of the shooter of a Grizzly and her cub in northern Idaho. The dead bears were discovered by a hiker and elicited the outrage of local hunters, conservationists, and conventional humans. Hunting a grizzly can bring up to a year in prison and a $100k fine. Have you seen any photos of your idiot friends shooting grizzlies on Facebook? That post could be worth $10k to you.

Jay Peak Buys Burke Mountain — Including Kingdom Trails

Steve Casimiro, Adventure Journal — Fri, 25 May 2012 07:00:45 PDT

Jay Peak, with backing from Canadian investment dollars, has greatly expanded in the past few years. They added a golf course, a hotel, water park, and other facilities. Now Jay’s added Burke, 45 minutes away, a smart play since Burke has more family-friendly terrain — and it has the awesomeness that is Kingdom Trails, over 100 miles of the most buff singletrack east of the Rockies. But… Burke seriously lacks amenities — there’s zero major lodging, and not a lick of good food. Jay’s investment surely means expanding both. If this sounds like deja vu, Burke was last gobbled up in 2008 by a Florida investment firm that then suffered mightily in the real estate crash. Via Burlington Free Press.

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Forest Fire Starter Gets 6 Years in Prison

Rocky Thompson — Fri, 25 May 2012 06:00:25 PDT

One of the two men who started a forest fire that burned 22 square miles of backcountry forest near the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park last summer was sentenced to 6 years in prison. His accomplice is expected to get the same sentence. The fire burned 14,100 acres and cost $15 million to fight. Eighteen firefighters were treated for heat exhaustion while putting out the fire. The two were reportedly under the influence of alcohol at the time. I love sitting around a campfire drinking beer as much as anyone, though I’ve never had the urge to burn the forest I was sitting in.

Whales are Like Bulldozers. Smart Ones.

Steve Casimiro, Adventure Journal — Thu, 24 May 2012 11:00:54 PDT

Scientists knew that whales can swallow up to 100 tons of water and krill in a single bite, but the lunging motion (jaws open, whale lunges forward, jaws close) wasn’t well understood. Now researchers have discovered that blue whales and others have a unique sensory organ at the opening of their mouths that tell whales not only how far to open their maws but also how to regulate the motion, how quickly, or not, in order to capture prey. Getting this motion right is crucial to a whale’s survival, since too quick a bite could actually explode the animal’s jaws under immense water pressure. Via BBC.

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Things You Shouldn’t Even Consider Buying: the Snow-Be Beacon

Rocky Thompson — Thu, 24 May 2012 10:00:36 PDT

The Snow-Be Beacon offers affordable avalanche safety. About $75 will get you an avalanche beacon. How do they sell it so cheap? Easy, the thing has no search mode. I guess you can always make new friends, and those conventional avalanche beacons that also help you find friends who have been buried in the snow are so expensive. Prepare for a little bit of awkwardness when you dig this out with your friends to do a beacon check. I suppose it’s an excuse for you to always get the first line down. This is likely the most dangerous piece of avalanche gear the world has even seen (besides a backpack loaded with nitroglycerine, I suppose).

Deer Act Like Predators

Michael Frank, Adventure Journal — Thu, 24 May 2012 09:00:04 PDT

…Worse, actually; deer act like humans. That is, with as many as 50 million white-tailed deer in the U.S., with no natural predators, deer, much like humans, are creating the equivalent threat to birds that suburban sprawl has. They’re eating away all of the forest under-story, where many songbirds prefer to nest. The answer isn’t going to come in the form of mountain lions, wolves, or hunters. Where the bulk of the deer dwell, in the Northeast U.S., there are just too many people. But forest managers need to scrap a practice of creating open browsing spaces within the woods that was adopted a century ago to save the once-threatened deer. They’re not threatened now — they’re a threat themselves. Via New York Times.

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