UKC

Interview in the New York Times with a hiker who was very lucky in Norway.  

'Almost everything had gone wrong on Alec Luhn’s solo hike in a national park in Norway.

Mr. Luhn, 38, had spent six days without food, water, or a working phone, as he dealt with serious injuries. But then, miraculously, he was rescued from a remote and steep mountain this month.

“It was a really great ending to a story that started with a couple of bad decisions,” Mr. Luhn said in a phone interview from a hospital in Bergen on Tuesday. “Hopefully, there are things to be learned from it for other people, as well."'

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/20/world/europe/alec-luhn-missing-hiker-nor...

If that link doesn't work for you try this: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/20/world/europe/alec-luhn-missing-hiker-nor...

That could easily have ended badly…very lucky they kept searching.

Major incidents are often the result of many smaller mistakes. 

Mony a mickle maks a muckle!

Glad for a good outcome, quite incredible surviving that. 

Mickle and muckle both mean big. The standard version of this proverb is, therefore, absurd. It should be either "pickle" and "mickle" or "puckle" and "muckle".

For example, Mickle Fell means big hill, not small hill.

Maybe I'm being over dramatic and definitely not wishing it on anyone! but wouldn't it have been more eye catching if the title had been 

"No Food, No Water, a Broken Leg - then things went really wrong"

You'd hope most wouldn't make any of these errors in the first place. 

Your boots fall apart hours into a multi day trip and press on. You ignore a camping spot at 10pm and push on etc etc. Even drinking your own wee just adds to or accelerates your dehydration further. 

How he survived and was found after multiple very poor decisions is amazing. 

It’s ok to drink someone else’s though? Asking for a friend obvs. 

That's not always true.  If you were well hydrated then the urine in your bladder may be very dilute initially.  

On that note, I'll just plop this in here.

With congratulations to Craig.

As someone experiencing the joys of catheterisation just now (but still able to get out on the hill, hooray!), it struck me the other day that if you got the tubing mixed up with a Platypus hydration system it could have unfortunate results.

Much like the “soldier in white” in Catch 22.
Completely covered in an all encompassing cast whilst in hospital the nurses visit him every 12 hours and simply swap the tubes round from each end of his body….

Right enough - mind you, he ends up dead (or is dead all along), whereas I'm still going, thus far at least.

Maybe Craig is responsible for this, too...

https://www.ukclimbing.com/forums/rock_talk/poo_on_dream-784055

 That was very much my thought process - the concept of 'cascading errors' immediately came to mind.  If a little thing goes wrong, then stop, assess, re-plan according to the circumstances.  The strategic objective is to get home, not get to the top of some hill.

My life is dotted with poor decisions. Somehow I am still alive and kicking in my 70s

Every gaffer taped your boots at the very beginning of a multi day walk into a road and comms less region, then kept going?

Every gaffer taped your boots at the very beginning of a multi day walk into a road and comms less region, then kept going?

Errrrr strangely no