Found Deceased CA - Lifei Huang, 22, hiking on Mount Baldy, 4 Feb 2024

[Cryptic]

I'm shocked at how aggressive and nasty hikers are to me when I do my volunteer gig on the trails at a national park; I'm in uniform, too.

That is awful.

I would never think of disrespecting a ranger or a life guard. I would heed any ranger advising me about anything.

Likewise, though I love swimming in all kinds of surf, when a life guard orders me back to the beach, I go back to the beach- fast. It does not matter I think about the conditions and what I know (or think I know) about my swimming ability.

 

[RickshawFan]

That is awful.

I would never think of disrespecting a ranger or a life guard. I would heed any ranger advising me about anything.

Likewise, though I love swimming in all kinds of surf, when a life guard orders me back to the beach, I go back to the beach- fast. It does not matter I think about the conditions and what I know (or think I know) about my swimming ability.

To give you a feel for what I’ve encountered on my volunteer gig:

I asked a woman to please not allow her 6-year old son to harass fish in a lake with a large branch he’d dragged out of the woods and to put the branch back in the woods (leave no trace ‘n’ all). The branch was about 8 feet long. She proceeded to help and encourage him dragging it to the lake and poking fish. She told me he was entitled to do so. She said they were there to enjoy nature, and this is how they liked to do it. I could go ahead and stick to my method, but they were going to stick to theirs.
Yep, in OUR National Park….

 

[LAhiker]

What she has was inadequate! Totally inadequate.!
How can you figure "she knew more than that"??

In defense of @LAhiker , I took her/him to mean that although what Lifei had was totally inadequate, she made a start with the goggles and rain gear.
I'm not sure those choices reflect knowing, though. Maybe Lifei just bought a new rain jacket, and wanted to try it out or take photos in real actual frosty rain. No telling how inexperienced folks decide on gear for a hike. Perhaps the goggles looked cool and would make a wow-ee impression on IG?
IMO, she had no experience whatever, except maybe a short sunshine hike or two in summer. I wonder what she had for footwear? Trail runners?

@RickshawFan has it right. I meant that though she was clearly unprepared for the conditions, her gear could have been worse. (I don't know what sort of shoes she had on.) The worst aspect, though, was the decision to hike that trail, under those conditions, alone.

I think I heard that from her AllTrails account (I think it's @Lifei but I'm not on AllTrails, so I don't know) she had posted a number of short hikes -- I think they were around 4 miles -- and only one very short hike in the Baldy area.

Her Instagram account includes a video of her skiing around a year ago. I can't tell if it's at the Baldy Ski area. Maybe the goggles are ski goggles.

JMO

 

[charminglane]

Would there be bears in February? Genuinely asking, no bears in my country. (Koalas are not bears.)

I had one crawl under my house a few weeks ago.
They really do not hibernate here.

 

[GraceG]

I had one crawl under my house a few weeks ago.
They really do not hibernate here.View attachment 482621

We found some ancient bottles of moonshine from prohibition under the porch of our 1905 Bungalow in Chicago (no it was NOT drinkable). As to the bears - there hasn't been any fatal bear attacks in California with the exception of a bear handler/training type incident and one at a zoo, in over 150 years. List of fatal bear attacks in North America - Wikipedia

 

[charminglane]

We found some ancient bottles of moonshine from prohibition under the porch of our 1905 Bungalow in Chicago (no it was NOT drinkable). As to the bears - there hasn't been any fatal bear attacks in California with the exception of a bear handler/training type incident and one at a zoo, in over 150 years. List of fatal bear attacks in North America - Wikipedia

There are so many here that there was a children's book written about one of them.

Amazon.com

 

[charminglane]

The weather here has been great for sunny and clear, but even if anyone were up on Baldy searching it is frigid.
I believe there is a storm coming in next weekend.

 

[GraceG]

She has been found deceased. They had to come in by air to bring a medic(s) to the scene due to the conditions but she had already passed. My heart goes out to her loved ones and all that risked their own lives to search for her in the storm. El Monte woman who went missing while hiking in Mount Baldy area found dead, officials say

 

[RickshawFan]

She has been found deceased. They had to come in by air to bring a medic(s) to the scene due to the conditions but she had already passed. My heart goes out to her loved ones and all that risked their own lives to search for her in the storm. El Monte woman who went missing while hiking in Mount Baldy area found dead, officials say

Interesting. SAR had to be hoisted down to the scene and couldn't get there by foot, as far as I can tell. What are the possibilities.....?
-swept away by avalanche
-she fell off a cliff
-she followed a brook or wash and got cliffed out (she couldn't go forwards or backwards)

I'm going for the latter. IMO there has to be a scenario where the remains were visible, despite recent snowfall, rain, etc. The only location I can really think of is a brook. I'm betting her camera and hat were in the brook, too.

Evidently, spotted by a drone. This would mean out in the open, not in a tree well, curled under branches, etc.

Photos of that area on AllTrails. Ref: San Antonio Creek Falls CA

She coulda slipped on an icy rock...

 

[LAhiker]

I'm thinking about the hat and camera bag. Surely a lightweight hat could be blown around in a snowstorm and not be in the location where it was lost, but if the camera bag had any weight to it (was the camera inside?), it likely wasn't blown away in a snowstorm. The question then is did LH place it where it was found? Did she fall from a distance above where it was found? I'd be curious to know if the hat and bag were found on the trail or off the trail, and if the location where they were found was near her last pinged location.

If it was a knit hat, it likely slid off (many do), or she pulled it off to take a better photo. This is what makes me concerned, especially since then she wouldn't have a hat, which by itself could be dangerous. I reckon a knit hat would warm you 10 degrees, but an inexperienced person might think the hood from a rain jacket would do. It might help, but IME not the same. I wonder if her fingers froze? Could she not work the zippers on her camera bag? Perhaps she had the camera around her neck, and didn't realize she dropped the bag. I'm not totally convinced she would be found in the area. She could have been cold and oblivious.
If SAR can't find her remains (with clothing--was it bright?) on top of the snow, and they didn't see footsteps, but they located the camera bag and hat unburied...to me that's odd. Perhaps they got dropped in a stream where snow wasn't accumulating? If you dropped those items in a stream, I'm not sure you'd pick them up in those conditions. A hat dropped in a stream would be useless.

Interesting. SAR had to be hoisted down to the scene and couldn't get there by foot, as far as I can tell. What are the possibilities.....?
-swept away by avalanche
-she fell off a cliff
-she followed a brook or wash and got cliffed out (she couldn't go forwards or backwards)

I'm going for the latter. IMO there has to be a scenario where the remains were visible, despite recent snowfall, rain, etc. The only location I can really think of is a brook. I'm betting her camera and hat were in the brook, too.

Evidently, spotted by a drone. This would mean out in the open, not in a tree well, curled under branches, etc.

Photos of that area on AllTrails. Ref: San Antonio Creek Falls CA

She coulda slipped on an icy rock...

Very sad outcome, though I'm glad she was found now rather than months later as happened with Julian Sands.

We may hear more about exactly where she was found and what they think happened, but here are some considerations. The Ski Hut Trail is far above the canyon that goes down to the multi-tier San Antonio Falls. I'd heard that her hat & camera bag were found closer to the falls, but it wasn't from a mainstream source so I couldn't mention it. It was also confusing why those items should be there but she wasn't.

She may have fallen into the canyon and gotten separated from her hat and bag during the fall. It's possible that the stream carried those items down the canyon, closer to the falls.

I had thought that if she fell into the canyon, that might've triggered an avalanche that buried her, or that she might've been covered by subsequent snowfall. Like @RickshawFan, I wonder how she was missed earlier if she was NOT covered by snow. It does look complicated in that canyon, with lots of snow-covered trees on the slopes and over the stream, so maybe something shifted or maybe they missed her. Searchers may not searched the entire canyon due to the high avalanche risk.

We're told she was found in the "Upper San Antonio Falls" area. If that means "near the upper falls" rather than being a broad term used to describe the upper parts of the canyon, she would have been found further down the canyon than a point directly below her last known position. In that case, it's possible that she had turned back and fell from the trail on her way back. It's possible that the term is being broadly. I doubt that the stream could've carried her down the canyon, but who knows. (Finally, it's possible that she fell into the canyon, was still alive, and tried to make her way down it, becoming cliffed out as @RickshawFan suggests. But I doubt that that heartbreaking scenario occurred. I don't think the searchers would've missed a moving person.)

JMO

 

[RickshawFan]

Very sad outcome, though I'm glad she was found now rather than months later as happened with Julian Sands.

We may hear more about exactly where she was found and what they think happened, but here are some considerations. The Ski Hut Trail is far above the canyon that goes down to the multi-tier San Antonio Falls. I'd heard that her hat & camera bag were found closer to the falls, but it wasn't from a mainstream source so I couldn't mention it. It was also confusing why those items should be there but she wasn't.

She may have fallen into the canyon and gotten separated from her hat and bag during the fall. It's possible that the stream carried those items down the canyon, closer to the falls.

I had thought that if she fell into the canyon, that might've triggered an avalanche that buried her, or that she might've been covered by subsequent snowfall. Like @RickshawFan, I wonder how she was missed earlier if she was NOT covered by snow. It does look complicated in that canyon, with lots of snow-covered trees on the slopes and over the stream, so maybe something shifted or maybe they missed her. Searchers may not searched the entire canyon due to the high avalanche risk.

We're told she was found in the "Upper San Antonio Falls" area. If that means "near the upper falls" rather than being a broad term used to describe the upper parts of the canyon, she would have been found further down the canyon than a point directly below her last known position. In that case, it's possible that she had turned back and fell from the trail on her way back. It's possible that the term is being broadly. I doubt that the stream could've carried her down the canyon, but who knows. (Finally, it's possible that she fell into the canyon, was still alive, and tried to make her way down it, becoming cliffed out as @RickshawFan suggests. But I doubt that that heartbreaking scenario occurred. I don't think the searchers would've missed a moving person.)

JMO

IMO SAR didn't find her because she was in an area they couldn't get to by foot. So, she wasn't "missed" so much as "not seen". If SAR couldn't get there, they couldn't look. Angle of sight matters, too. But since they had to be winched down to the spot, it clearly was not humanly accessible except by air. A citizen's drone spotted her.

The drone could only have found her in an open area. Since those AllTrails photos have a lot of vegetation, I assumed this would be in the falls or stream. Besides, to see her at all she'd have been in that area, because the rushing water might not have been completely covered in snow, thus not accumulating over the hat, camera case, or the remains, so they were visible. Plus, the area was open enough that a helicopter could winch down a team.

I'm leaning towards she was taking an IG selfie and slipped on an icy rock (even from freezing mist in the general area, so she might have thought it low-risk) in the stream bed. They might even be able to figure this out if they looked at the memory in her camera. The fact that the camera was separated from the bag suggests to me she was in the act of taking a photo.

It's possible an avalanche was involved, but IMO there wouldn't be an avalanche on the stream bed. It would be in another open area.

I don't think she'd be able to survive if she fell into the frigid water of that stream: she had no way to get dry or warm up. But a fall could also have killed her, e.g. by hitting her head on a rock. Hopefully, the latter happened, because death would be quick.

 

[LAhiker]

IMO SAR didn't find her because she was in an area they couldn't reach by foot. A citizen's drone spotted her.

The drone could only have found her in an open area. Since those AllTrails photos have a lot of vegetation, I assumed this would be in the falls or stream. Besides, to see her at all she'd have been in that area, because the rushing water might not have been completely covered in snow, thus not accumulating over the hat, camera case, or the remains, so they were visible. Plus, the area was open enough that a helicopter could winch down a team.

I'm leaning towards she was taking an IG selfie and slipped on an icy rock in the stream bed. They might even be able to figure this out if they looked at the memory in her camera. The fact that the camera was separated from the bag suggests to me she was in the act of taking a photo.

It's possible an avalanche was involved, but IMO there wouldn't be an avalanche on the stream bed. It would be in another open area.

I don't think she'd be able to survive if she fell into the frigid water of that stream: she had no way to get dry or warm up. But a fall could also have killed her, e.g. by hitting her head on a rock. Hopefully, the latter happened, because death would be quick.

I agree with your thoughts about where she must've been and why she wasn't found sooner. I also agree that she couldn't have survived falling in the stream.

But though she may indeed have slipped while taking a photo, she was going up the Ski Hut Trail, which is high above the stream. At her last known location on that trail, the trail is 400-500 feet above the stream, down a steep slope. It would have been very hard to go down to the stream deliberately, and despite her lack of experience, I don't think she would have tried to do so. That's why I think she probably fell into the canyon. As you note, her camera may offer some clues.

Very sad situation, but I'm glad she was found. And like you, I hope it was quick.

JMO

(Closer to the Ski Hut, the trail is less high above the stream, but if that's where she was, I think she would've been found much earlier and the location of her remains would've been described differently.)

 

[Dre]

So sad! I’m glad her family didn’t have to wonder in agony for too long

 

[RickshawFan]

I agree with your thoughts about where she must've been and why she wasn't found sooner. I also agree that she couldn't have survived falling in the stream.

But though she may indeed have slipped while taking a photo, she was going up the Ski Hut Trail, which is high above the stream. At her last known location on that trail, the trail is 400-500 feet above the stream, down a steep slope. It would have been very hard to go down to the stream deliberately, and despite her lack of experience, I don't think she would have tried to do so. That's why I think she probably fell into the canyon. As you note, her camera may offer some clues.

Very sad situation, but I'm glad she was found. And like you, I hope it was quick.

JMO

(Closer to the Ski Hut, the trail is less high above the stream, but if that's where she was, I think she would've been found much earlier and the location of her remains would've been described differently.)

Oh, now I get what you were talking about with the canyon. I can’t picture where the trails go, relative to the terrain. I had assumed she was on the San Antonio Falls Trail.

I’m looking at contours. Now I see what you mean with the steep drop off into the canyon.

Did she take the route you normally take to climb Baldy? Or is it just a trail with nice scenery and a stop at the ski hut, but no peak bagging?

We might still be able to go with half my thought, namely, she stepped on a slick rock. If it was raining and frosty, well, pretty much all exposed rocks would be slick.

 

[LAhiker]

Oh, now I get what you were talking about with the canyon. I can’t picture where the trails go, relative to the terrain. I had assumed she was on the San Antonio Falls Trail.

I’m looking at contours. Now I see what you mean with the steep drop off into the canyon.

Did she take the route you normally take to climb Baldy? Or is it just a trail with nice scenery and a stop at the ski hut, but no peak bagging?

We might still be able to go with half my thought, namely, she stepped on a slick rock. If it was raining and frosty, well, pretty much all exposed rocks would be slick.

There are three main routes to climb Baldy (the Bear Canyon Trail, the Ski Hut Trail, and the route via the Notch & the Devil's Backbone) as well as some more obscure & difficult ones.

Of these three, the Ski Hut Trail, aka the Baldy Bowl Trail, is the middle in terms of difficulty. (In winter, it's also safer than the Devil's Backbone.) The Ski Hut Trail ascends almost 4000 feet to the summit in less than 4 miles. At 8,200 feet, San Antonio Ski Hut is a little over halfway to the top in terms of both elevation and distance.

At the beginning, you're on a fire road; the elevation gain is harder because most of it doesn't start until you get to the Ski Hut Trail, which isn't marked. I think they figured out that LH initially overshot the entrance to the Ski Hut Trail, which is not unusual.

https://www.alltrails.com/trail/us/california/san-antonio-ski-hut

A February 11 review of the trail on AllTrails there mentions how slippery the trail was. So yes, she could've slipped on a rock, or just slipped. If the trail was covered with snow, it's also possible that she got a bit off-trail and then slipped. I've also heard that there are some confusing spots on that trail, so maybe she took a wrong turn. (I haven't been up it in years and was with a group both times, so I didn't have to figure out the trail.)

One can definitely go up to the Ski Hut and turn around (which may have been her plan), but it's still a challenging trail. That LH got as far as she did under those conditions implies that despite her lack of experience or understanding of the conditions, she was fairly strong. But she may have been exhausted by the time she got to her last known location.

Here's a description from 2011 of a hike to the summit via that route. To clarify & correct my earlier post, just before the Ski Hut, the stream is level with the trail. (I think a spring that I contributes to the stream has been diverted through the kitchen of the Ski Hut.) But I don't think LH got all the way up to the Ski Hut. Also, the very top part of the stream near the Ski Hut would've been easy to search. If she'd been found there, it would have happened much sooner and they probably would've said she was found near or below the Ski Hut rather than in the "upper San Antonio Creek Falls area."

Mt. Baldy Hike - August 7, 2011

Descriptive narratives of hikes by Dan Simpson in the San Gabriel Mountains; including photos and links to trusted hike guides on Dan's Hiking Pages

danshikingblog.blogspot.com

P.S. It's called a ski hut, but the actual skiing on Baldy is much further down. The San Antonio Ski Hut is a backcountry hut that is maintained by the Sierra Club.

JMO

 

[imstilla.grandma]

*sad sad news
A person flying a drone near the upper San Antonio Creek Falls area alerted the U.S. Forest Department Saturday afternoon that they may have spotted Lifei Huang, who was reported missing on Feb. 4. The sheriff’s department was then informed of the tip but due to conditions on the mountain, rescue team members were unable to reach the spot where they believed the missing hiker was.

Sunday morning, medics were able to reach the location via air rescue and found Huang dead. The rescue team and Huang’s body were then airlifted off the mountain, according to law enforcement.

Body of missing hiker from El Monte recovered near Mt. Baldy

The body of a 22-year-old El Monte woman who went missing while hiking Mt. Baldy has been found, according to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department.

www.nbclosangeles.com

 

[iamshadow21]

<modsnip: Quoted post was removed>

Absolutely NOT my area, but Google is suggesting Robert Koester as a big name in the field?

 

[mickey2942]

"Lost Person Behavior". Absolutely fascinating the things I learn here, so randomly. I am going to have to read up on this.

Meet the World’s Preeminent Expert in Lost Person Behavior, a Double Hoo

Robert Koester has led more than 100 rescue missions and has a 96% success rate.

news.virginia.edu

 

[Sundog]

So tragic for Lifei Huang who is a victim in this situation. She set out likely to take some photos and enjoy and share the beauty of the area with the snowfall and she succombed to the elements. Whether she was dressed for the occasion or whatever decisions she made that day, regardless - she is a victim. I pray for her loved ones and friends as they grieve her loss and may she rest in peace.

 

[RickshawFan]

Absolutely NOT my area, but Google is suggesting Robert Koester as a big name in the field?

Yes, it's Robert Koester, but I can't find the exact interview where he told the story of the AT thru hikers in the Whites. That story happens to be very illustrative!

Robert Koester is pretty much THE "lost person behavior" guy. Almost all official units now use his research, which is based on hundreds of thousands of incidents. He can statistically tell LE/SAR where to look with the highest likelihood of success. He has different models for hikers, toddlers, fishermen, Alzheimers, etc. etc. Every type has different "lost person" behaviors. This is not just a wilderness thing: they use it for missing persons in town, too.