Hiker Mary Owen knew people should have been looking and praying for her when she didn't return from a planned day trip to Mount Hood's summit. But stranded in a canyon with an injured leg and a shrinking supply of food, Owen felt nothing but silence.
The 23-year-old hiker, a George Fox University student who grew up in Grants Pass, had planned to reach the top of the 11,249-foot mountain since she crossed it while hiking the Pacific Crest Trail in 2010. She planned a trip with friends for this spring break, but when her companions changed their plans, Owen decided to make the trip alone.
"It was a really headstrong decision," she said Sunday in an interview from her bed in Legacy Emanuel Medical Center, where she was to undergo surgery.
Leaving the pack she used for longer trips behind, she set out Sunday morning in leggings, a few layers of clothing and trail-running shoes, and a JanSport backpack stocked with more than enough food and supplies for the trip she planned to complete in about 13 hours.
Owen was struck by a whiteout less than 1,000 feet from her destination, and confusion in the snowy darkness led her down the mountain in the wrong direction, funneling her into a canyon at about 4,600 feet.
"The snow was so deep it was like swimming upstream if I tried to fight it," she said, so she followed the canyon down, planning to find a spot not too steep where she could climb out. "That's kind of where I got into trouble."
Around 4 a.m. Monday, she fell about 40 feet over rocky terrain, badly cutting her leg.
"I made a little snow hollow and went to sleep," she said. "I figured I'd assess the damage in the morning."
When she woke, Owen found a large gash and couldn't lift her leg, ruling out the possibility of walking to safety. Since she had noted on a registration form that she should return before 5 a.m. Monday, Owen expected people to begin searching for her that morning. She said she found out after being rescued that her registration was lost, but while she was stranded, she didn't know why no one came for her.
"I kept thinking, 'Where is everybody?'" she said. "Usually when people are looking for you and praying for you, you can feel it. And there was just nothing. That was really hard."
Owen spent her first days in the snow hollow drifting in and out of sleep, melting snow to drink in water bottles in the sun and trying to stretch the food she had. The cell phone she had brought on the trip got no reception in the canyon.
Mary_Owen_in_pack.jpgView full sizeMary Owen, 23, is an experienced hiker but was stranded on Mount Hood when she injured her leg while hiking alone.Clackamas County Sheriff's Office
When she began to see the trickles of snow that can turn into an avalanche, Owen scooted across the snow to a cluster of trees, where she dug a new hollow and gathered sticks to use along with her Nutri-Grain wrappers to build a small fire. She couldn't keep the flame going long, but she warmed her hands and dried her clothes as much as she could.
When it rained, she collected water in her poncho -- "it was nice to get a whole mouthful of water."
By Wednesday, when Owen ran out of the Nutri-Grain bars, crackers, ramen noodles and the chia seeds she'd brought, friends had begun to worry. Her family called police, and Thursday they found the car she had driven to the mountain.
"One of the hardest things out there was from Sunday night to Friday morning, I hadn't heard from God at all," she said. "It was just dead quiet. There was nobody praying for me. I didn't hear anything or feel anything."
Each night, she dreamed of people coming to help her, but each one failed her test: "I told myself if they could give me a cold drink of water, it wasn't a delusion."
Then Owen awoke Friday morning, and the silence was gone.
"I woke up with a lot of peace and the sense that thousands and thousands of people were praying for me," she said. "That was really powerful. I thought, 'Today is the day they're going to find me.'"
Owen crawled onto the canyon ridge and waited. Around sunset, she saw planes overhead. They circled and flew away. Another plane followed and also left.
"I was so sure they had seen me," she said. "I just get screaming, 'Come back for me, please!'"
She gave up and crawled back to her hollow near the trees and slept again. On Saturday morning, she crawled to the ridgeline once more so rescuers would see her and waited for the sun to hit her.
"That was right about when the helicopters came down," she said, and she scrambled to meet them, thanking God and those who had come to save her.
AX232_70C8_9.JPGView full size Mary Owen, 23, is recovering from frostbite and other injuries at Legacy Emanuel Hospital. Brent Wojahn/The Oregonian
Safely off the mountain, Owen began to recover from her injuries: the gash on her thigh, a minor injury to her right leg and frostbite on both feet.
"I hope I get my toes," she said. "I like to run around barefoot."
But despite her injuries, Owen said she always knew she wouldn't die on Mount Hood.
"I feel I have a purpose in life, and there's a really good reason why I'm alive," said Owen, who plans to serve in the missionary field as a bible translator.
Still, Owen said the disaster forced her to reconsider the way she communicates with others and consider the impact of her actions.
"It's not something I'd ever really thought about because I've never faced it before," she said, "but it's not just you and God, and it's not just you and your own strength and your own adventures. There are people out there who care about you."
Owen vows to communicate more with the people she loves and stick to safer areas when she's hiking solo, but she said the ordeal hasn't made her at all afraid of the wild.
"I love being out in the wilderness. It's like walking through God," she said. "There were times when I was so worried I wouldn't be found in time or angry or frustrated or fed up with being cold that I wanted to die, but the wilderness is still gorgeous. It's still God's territory. I'll definitely be out there again."
— Emily Fuggetta
http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2013/03/6_days_stranded_on_mount_hood.html#incart_river_default
Thu Oct 28, 2021 8:37 pm by Camille
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