What to Do if You Get Lost in the Appalachian Mountains

Video Transcript

Hi this is David Jackel on behalf of Expert Village, and I am here to talk to you about what to do if you get lost in the Appalachian Mountains. Now fortunately, it is rather difficult to get lost in the Appalachian Mountains. They are not very big mountains, they are heavily populated and people are traveling through them all the time. If you do get lost though, the most important thing to do is to not panic, because once you panic it is that much more difficult to do anything else. So do not panic and try to determine where you are. If you are carrying a map, and you should always be carrying a map, check with the map and see if you can figure out your general location. You will need to figure out what direction you are looking at. You can do that if you have a compass. Also, if you do not have a compass, and I usually do not carry a compass, you can look up at the sky and check the location of the sun. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west and you can use that as your guide to figure out which general direction you are traveling in. If you have a general sense of where you are and you are carrying a cell phone, you should try giving someone a call. However, this may be difficult as there is not much reception when you are up there in the mountains. Listen for a stream. They make noise, particularly if you are near a waterfall, and once you find a stream you can follow it downhill. Once you get down to the bottom of the mountain you are more likely to run into other people particularly if that stream has turned into rivers because rivers are more likely to run through towns. It also helps to look around to see if you can get a larger panoramic view of where you are because then you may see road in the distance, you may see a river in the distance, you may even see other people, so move into a clear area where you can look out along the mountain to see where you are. Now listening helps because listening means you can hear water, you can hear other people, you can hear cars, therefore making noise also helps. If you are lost, make some noise; shout out help, someone may hear you. Remember, the mountains are very populated, and sooner or later someone is going to hear you. So get downhill, make noise, listen for water and you are going to get found.

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