by Aron Ralston
From desert survival stories I’ve read, I know dehydration can kill you by slightly variable mechanisms, but fundamentally, they all entail your organs not receiving adequate nutrients to the point that they shut down. Some people expire once their kidneys fail and their body’s own toxicity kills them; other people last until their heart collapses. Under exertion in hot environments, dehydration can lead to overheating, and you effectively cook your brain. Whatever way death might come to me, convulsions and severe cramping will most likely herald it. I start to speculate…
I wonder what kidney failure will feel like? Not good, probably. Maybe like when you eat so much you get cramps in your back. Only worse, I bet. It’s gonna be a rough way to die. Hypothermia would be better, if it’s fast onset. At least then I could slip off in mind numbness and not feel it. The temperature didn’t dip that low last night, though, only about 55 degrees. Not cold enough for severe hypothermia. Maybe death by a flash flood would be better? Not so much. Is it better to go out with a scream cut off by a wall of muddy water, to fade silently into a cold-induced coma, or to have the final experience of the gasping spasms of heart failure? I don’t know…
But I’m ready for action, not for dying. It is time to get a better anchor established, one that I can use to rig a lifting system and try to move the boulder. If I can rotate the front of the chockstone up, maybe as much as a foot, I can pull out my hand, though that’s a long way to move a rock this size. Maybe I can budge the boulder backward enough to ease its grip and create a two-inch gap—that’s all I need to get the thicker pad of my thumb out of its trap. I know it’s going to hurt worse than the accident itself, because it will be slow and self-inflicted. The hand is done for; I’ve already written it off. But what happens when blood starts circulating in it again? Will it carry the decay back into my bloodstream and poison my heart? Medically, I’m uninformed about the potential threat involved, but spreading toxins seems like a logical result if I’m able to suddenly free my hand. It’s a risk I accept, and one I can only hope to face.
My first move in attempting to create a second anchor is to unclip my stowed fluorescent yellow webbing from its carabiner on the back of my harness and unwrap the tidy chain of storage loops. I untie the knot holding the two ends together and string the twenty-five-foot length back and forth across the top of the chockstone, trying to keep it stacked neatly apart from the ropes of my current harness support system. Facing upcanyon from my manacling point, I guess at the contours and edges that may or may not exist on top of the chockstones that form the shelf above and in front of me. I wasn’t paying close enough attention to their shape when I was up there yesterday afternoon. It appears to me that a shallow triangular horn sticks out in the middle of the shelf nearly six feet over my head. Perhaps if there is a substantial enough in-cut feature on the back of the horn, a strand of webbing could catch and drape over each side of the horn without pulling over the top of it.
My attempts to toss the webbing up over the horn founder; the material doesn’t have sufficient heft for me to throw it in the air accurately. When I can get it high enough, the yellow fabric pulls itself off the horn, almost bouncing off the rock like it’s somehow become spring-loaded. I puzzle over a solution and decide to tie the currently unused end of my climbing rope to one end of the webbing and try throwing the rope over the horn, then drawing the webbing over the horn with the heavier leader. The next dozen attempts—each a prolonged and tedious effort of recovering and reorganizing the rope and webbing, and getting my body back into position so I can try again—all fail as well. I can get the rope over the horn, but as the knot slides over the top, it loses precious centimeters. Subsequently, the webbing is too far forward on the point of the shelf to securely catch on the smooth sandstone. Time after time, the webbing pulls free and falls to the sand on the other side of my chockstone.
A fissure on the right side of the horn catches my eye. Maybe I can slip the webbing into that slot and give it a better angle to slide around the back of the horn more steadily. The next time I throw and pull the rope, right as the knot is about to crest the horn, I put the rope leader in my teeth and gently twitch the webbing. It responds by slipping back into the slot. Aha! This time, I tug the knot over the shelf’s lip. I can see the difference in how the webbing drapes farther over the back of the salmon-colored horn. Slowly reeling in the leader, I know I’ve got a workable setting for my anchor. Untying the knot connecting rope and webbing, I slip a metal rappel ring over the yellow strap and tie a series of overhand knots in the webbing until it hangs in a loop with the ring at the bottom. I tug on the loop with my left hand, tightening the knot and testing its placement around the outcropping. The webbing doesn’t creep at all as I apply more and more of my body weight. It’s set.
Checking my watch, I note that it’s already after eleven on Sunday morning. I’ve spent two hours just getting the anchor reconfigured, but the endeavor has been an unqualified success so far. My prescribed sip of water enhances my feeling of satisfaction. I’m using discipline well, and I’m pleased with myself over the accomplishment of setting an anchor from below—and single-handedly at that—around an unlikely feature.
Good work, Aron. Now all you’ve got to do is move the boulder. Don’t stop now.
Cutting my climbing rope about thirty feet from one end, I loop one end of the short piece around my chockstone and tie it to itself. Next I thread the other end up through the rappel ring—I can just reach the ring with my left hand. Without expecting any movement of the boulder, I yank on the rope. Sure enough, nothing.
Well, at least the anchor is holding.
I need to fashion a pulley system to create some mechanical advantage. With the single bend in the rope, I’m not lifting the boulder with as much force as I’m pulling on the line. Friction at the rap ring is actually making this setup a mechanical disadvantage system. Unfortunately, I don’t have any pulleys with me; I do have carabiners, though they’ll have a much greater friction loss. Attempting to tear down the ’biner-block anchor that I was previously using to suspend my harness, I flip the rope again and again until the jumbled mess of interconnected links unwedges from the crack.
Time lapses unnoticed for me now; I’m wholly attuned to my endeavor with the rope system. I call upon my training in search and rescue and design a scheme in my mind that will replicate the technical hauling systems we use to evacuate immobilized patients from vertical rock faces. The Albuquerque rescue team taught me two standard systems, and I choose between them, deciding on a Z-pulley system with an additional redirection of the haul line. Modifying the typical system layout for my space and equipment constraints, I add Prusik loops of tied runners clipped to carabiners to connect the rope back to itself. With two such changes in direction, I’ve theoretically tripled the force applied at the haul point—a mechanical advantage ratio of 3:1. Due to my improvisations, the friction in my system is probably halving that advantage, but 1.5:1 is still better than 0.5:1, like my first attempt.
Still, the system is too weak. The boulder ignores my efforts. At the end of the haul line, I tie a set of slipknots that slide onto stopper knots, creating foot loops. Stepping into the loops makes me about two feet taller in the canyon, and though I’m in an awkward position due to my stuck hand, I can now put most of my body weight into service on the haul line. I’ve probably tripled or quadrupled the force that I could apply when I was gripping the rope with one hand. The haul line is taut, even through the bends at the carabiners, and my system is working as designed. However, because I’m using a dynamic climbing rope, meant to stretch and absorb the energy of a climbing fall, I lose much of the force I’m exerting on the haul line. Flailing through hours of taxing work, and several unsuccessful iterations of raising the anchor webbing a few inches by tying another knot above the rap ring, I never once budge the rock. I’m doing the best I can with my available materials. Maybe I could rig a 5:1 system—I have enough carabiners and webbing—but I would need another foot
of space between the anchor and the rock to fit all the bends of the larger system. Discouraged from the effort and the lack of measurable progress, I stop for a break and glance at my watch. It’s after one o’clock in the afternoon, and I’m sweating and panting.
Suddenly, I hear distant voices echoing in the canyon. My mind swears in exhilarated surprise, and my breath abruptly catches in my dry throat.
Could it be? It’s the right time of day—a group would get to this part and be able to return out to the West Fork or to Horseshoe Trailhead in daylight. And just like you figured, the odds are better that others will come through on a weekend day. After all, that’s how you came to be here yesterday afternoon.
Even reasoning it through, I’m afraid I may be delusional, that the sounds are in my head. Holding my breath, I listen.
Yes! The noises are distorted and far off but familiar: shoes scrabbling on sandstone. It’s probably a group of canyoneers descending the first drop-off, back at the S-log.
“HELP!”
The caterwauling echoes of my shout fade in the canyon. Forcing myself not to breathe, I listen for a reply. Nothing.
“HELLLP!”
The desperation of my quivering shout disturbs me. Again I hold my breath. After the dying fall of my shout, there is no returning sound besides the thumping of my excited heart. A critical moment passes, my hopes evaporate, and I know there are no people in this canyon.
My morale slumps in a pang, like the first time a girl broke my heart. Then I hear the noises again. This time I know better and I wait. The echoes I took to be approaching canyoneers resolve into the scratchy sounds of a kangaroo rat in his nest in the debris jammed around the suspended chockstone above and behind my head. I rotate and see his tail whip across a pile of twigs as he disappears into his hole.
In that moment, I promise myself that I will yell for help only once a day. Hearing my voice’s shaky timbre nearly panicked me, and to yell out any more often would undermine my effort to maintain a calm and clearheaded demeanor. Rationally, I know there will be no one coming down this canyon until perhaps the next weekend, when the search teams will be scouring the backcountry for my body. Since my voice can be heard fifty yards away at most, and the nearest people would be five to seven miles away, it serves no positive purpose to shout myself scared.
Around two o’clock, I reconsider my status and my options. Waiting, chipping, and lifting have all played out unsuccessfully. For the first time, I seriously contemplate amputating my arm, thinking through the process and possible consequences. Laying out everything I have on the surfaces around me, I think through each item’s possible use in a surgery. My two biggest concerns are a cutting tool that can do the job, and a tourniquet that will keep me from bleeding out. There are two blades on my multi-tool: The inch-and-a-half blade is sharper than the three-inch one. It will be important to use the longer blade for hacking at the chockstone and preserve the shorter blade for the potential surgery.
I instinctively understand that even with the sharper blade, I won’t be able to saw through my bones. I’ve seen the hacksaws that Civil War–era doctors used for amputating patients’ legs and arms in battlefield hospitals, and I don’t have anything that could approximate even a rudimentary saw. I’ve made an assumption that I want to amputate as little of my arm as possible. This unstated parameter leads me to think strictly in terms of cutting through the bones of my forearm, as opposed to going through the cartilage of my elbow joint. The latter possibility never occurs to me, preemptively eliminating the likeliest method.
A vivid memory from a movie of a heroin user shooting up, with a length of surgical tubing wrapped around his arm, gives me the idea to experiment with a tourniquet of tubing from my empty CamelBak. I cut the tubing free from the reservoir and manage to tie it in a simple knot around my upper forearm, just below the elbow. The placement comes to me without consideration of the pressure points nearer my biceps. I’m thinking I will have to twist the tubing so tightly that it will permanently damage part of my arm; therefore, I should put it as close to the cutting site as possible. The knot in the tubing is loose, and I can’t cinch it down even after redoing it three times: The plastic material is too stiff to allow a small knot that would stay snug around my arm. I look around for a stick to put in the tourniquet, but there aren’t any thick enough for my needs. To tighten the tubing will require a force that would snap any stick I can reach.
So much for that idea.
I have a piece of purple webbing knotted in a loop that I untie and wrap around my forearm. A five-minute effort yields a doubled knot, but the loops are too loose to stop my circulation. Again, I need a stick…or I can use a carabiner and twist the loops tighter with that. I clip the gate of my last unused carabiner through the loops and rotate it twice. The webbing presses deeply into my forearm, and the skin nearer my wrist takes on the pallor of a fish belly. I’ve fashioned an effective tourniquet, and seeing my makeshift medical setup working brings me a subtle sense of satisfaction.
Nice work, Aron.
What else will I need? Basic first aid says to put direct pressure on a wound, so I’ll need something to wrap the end of my arm, minimizing any blood flow that sneaks past the tourniquet. The cushioned crotch of my biking shorts would make a good absorbent pad, and with the four feet of unused yellow webbing that I could cut from the anchor, I can secure the shorts around the end of my arm. Then I can stick my stump into my CamelBak mini-backpack, and with both straps around my neck, the pack will act like a sling, immobilizing my arm across my chest. Perfect.
Despite my optimism, there’s a darker undercurrent to my brainstorming. Though my mind is working on the amputation scenario, the operation is still only a theoretical possibility. I’m thinking, “If I cut off my arm, how will I stop the blood loss?” and “If I cut off my arm, how will I pad and sling my stump?” Because my knife is too dull, the rest of the plan is no more than an idle mental exercise. Until I figure out how to cut through the bones, amputation isn’t a practical choice; it’s more a point of theory that allows me to follow through on all my options. I wonder about my courage level and how my mental state will change if I can solve the riddle. As a test, I expose the shorter blade of my multi-tool and hold it to my skin. The tip pokes between the tendons and veins a few inches up from my trapped wrist, indenting my flesh. The sight repulses me.
What are you doing, Aron? Get that knife away from your wrist! What are you trying to do, kill yourself? That’s suicide! I don’t care how good a tourniquet you have, you’ve got too many arteries in your arm to stop them all. You’ll bleed out. You slice your wrist, and it’s as good as stabbing yourself in the gut. If you manage to get through the bones and free yourself, say you make it down as far as the rappel. That tourniquet won’t make a damn difference—the rescuers will find your depleted body sometime next month, pecked clean by buzzards down in that canyon. Cutting your arm off is just a slow act of suicide.
I feel vaguely ill and drop my left hand, allowing the knife to ease away from my skin. I can’t do it. Maybe I’m not ready to pursue amputation any further at the moment. Maybe that argumentative voice is right, though, maybe it is suicide. I’ll have to be a lot more strung out to go through with the amputation. Who knows, maybe some random person will come along tomorrow. All I can be certain of at this point is that, should the need arise for a prolonged and nasty operation—such as hacking through my bones like I was doing to the chockstone—my fortitude will have to be at an all-time high. I shudder at the thought, my eyes close softly, and my mouth gapes open. I can picture my blood spilled on the canyon walls, the torn flesh and ripped muscles of my arm dangling in gory strands from two white bones pockmarked with divots, the result of my last efforts to chisel through my arm’s structural frame. Then I see my head drooped to my sagging torso, my body lifelessly hanging from the knife-nicked bones. It’s like watching the closing sequence of a film, but it doesn’t fade to black. It’s my waking nightmare, a premonition t
hat causes me to set my knife down on the chockstone’s shelf and retch.
Slowly, I blink. My vision blurs in a nauseating swirl, but then it stabilizes and my equilibrium returns. With the sickening surgical practice session over, I review my situation. I no longer have any options that I haven’t already examined and tabled as ineffective or deadly. Even though I’ve followed each potential scenario through its preliminary stages, I can’t presently go further with any of them. I’m stymied at every turn. I’ll die before help arrives, I can’t excavate my hand, I can’t lift the boulder, and I can’t cut off my arm. A sinking depression hits me for the first time. The optimism that has graced me for the last day is gone, and I feel lonely, angry, and scared. I whimper to myself: “I am going to die.” Probably in another two days, not that it matters when.
I will die here.
I will waste away here.
I will shrivel up, slumping here with my arm trapped in this place, when dehydration decides to stop toying around and finally kills me.
Why do I even bother drinking my water? It’s only prolonging my ordeal. Dismally, I wish for a flash flood to end it all. The thought of intentionally slitting my wrists fleetingly dashes in and out of my mind. My despair turns to adolescent anger. I hate this boulder. I hate it! I hate this canyon. I hate the morgue-cold slab pressing against my right forearm. I hate the faint musty smell of the greenish slime thinly glazing the bottom of the southern canyon wall behind my legs. I hate the breezes that blow grit in my face and the dim half-light of this claustrophobic hole where even the sandstone looks menacing.
“I…hate…this!” I punctuate each word with slaps of my left palm against the chockstone as tears well in my eyes.
The echoes of my anguish reverberate up the canyon and vanish into the afternoon. Then another voice, this one inside my head, speaks coolly.
