Fool survives for three weeks in Alaskan woods after burning tarp-dwelling down

He was just rescued after relatives in Utah, where he lived before traveling to Alaska in September, asked police to perform a welfare check (the man is white) as they hadn't heard from him in "weeks".

Quote:

In aerial footage shared by the troopers, Tyson steps out among the snow-covered remains of his home, waving to the troopers in a helicopter, a large "SOS" carved out of the snow behind him. "Everything that I owned was consolidated in that cabin," Steele told troopers, who shared Steele's survival account in the detailed release. In the weeks after the fire, Steele said, he survived on the remnants of canned rations and peanut butter, sleeping in a snow cave and makeshift shelter that he built around his wood stove. Steele had been living on his homestead, about 20 miles from Skwentna, since September, he told state troopers. He described his home as a Quonset hut -- a lightweight frame, covered in plastic tarps -- that he bought from a Vietnam veteran. He admitted to the troopers that the fire resulted from a "hasty" mistake. In a hurry to get a fire started, he stuck a large piece of cardboard into his wood stove. He believes a piece of the flaming cardboard went out the chimney and landed on the roof. Steele woke up in the middle of the night on either December 17 or 18 -- he couldn't recall the exact date, troopers said -- and heard melting plastic coming from the roof. After Steele stepped outside, he said, "I just see that the whole roof's on fire." He didn't know enough about the surrounding area, including which of the many waterways in the area would be frozen over enough to cross, Steele told the troopers. He gathered the food that survived the fire -- canned goods, some beans and peanut butter, and figured he had enough food to have two cans a day for a month. But a lot of the food had popped open in the heat of the blaze, he said, and mixed with the smoke of his burning hut. "So it tastes like my home, just burning." Steele had a "crappy" phone that he'd been using to check in with friends and family, but authorities said it was lost in the fire. So he hoped someone would call for a welfare check after they hadn't heard from him. If someone hadn't come by Day 35, he'd set out.

It's hard to choose where to begin with this. Let's start with the "home" itself I suppose. The man describes it as a "Quonset hut", but Quonset huts aren't made out of tarps, so what he actually seems to be describing is some kind of tarp-shed or carport - something never intended for long-term human habitation at any rate - and evidently he had decided despite his admitted unfamiliarity with the area that this would be a sufficient permanent home to pass the Alaskan winter in. Next, he decided that having a fire going inside this tarp-structure, his only source of shelter for 20 miles, ought to be A-OK.

Not actually knowing anything about the area - possibly including such details as "which direction to walk to find people" - when his phone was destroyed in the fire his only option was to ration the surviving remnants of his food and "hope someone (from Utah) would call for a welfare check".

I am glad he was rescued and I am sad that his dog was not lucky enough to survive this grand mistake; but what we seem to have here is another Christopher McCandless situation. This man had the sense to pack food with him at least (although perhaps not much more sense than that), but he very nearly lost it anyway.

via International Skeptics Forum https://ift.tt/2QKzZX1