CA - Jonathan Gerrish, Ellen Chung, daughter, 1 & dog, suspicious death hiking area, Aug 2021 #2

[wary]

Most media reports I've seen state that the mom was found less than 100 feet away from her husband. If she were truly racing to get help, she would have made it a lot farther than that.

I have no idea what happened, but I think the most plausible scenario is that someone in the family was in distress and they all stopped for an extended period of time. Everyone's condition then worsened while baking in the sun. At some point--perhaps several hours later--the wife was the only one of the two adults who was still conscious. In an extremely weakened state, she tried to hike up trail but collapsed after a few seconds of effort.

Again, I don't know what happened, but the fact that the wife only made it a few feet up the trail suggests that she was already extremely compromised by the time she decided to try to go for help.

I agree.

My theory (subject to change as more evidence comes in,) is that the husband was in distress. I think that if the baby had been, they’d have kept going to get help.

So, I think it’s likely that the husband settled down to rest and she waited with him. It’s very common for people to not realize that they can’t ‘rest and drink water’ to recover from serious heat stroke.

Then she gets worse, her thinking is impaired from the heat, and by the time she realizes that she MUST go on and try to get help, it’s too late for her to go far.

 

[d4i5y]

I agree completely. I suspect that not only is the heat more intense this year, such that even heat-hiking-familiar folks are being caught off guard, but that the smoke particulates in the air, visible or not, is reducing people's capabilities beyond their expectations.

MOO

I agree with this. Also, my mother grew up in East Africa and every time we would go for holidays, she made us drink a small glass of orange juice with salt and sugar every morning with breakfast. I know there are better drinks now but I often think on how many people who exercise a lot don’t realise how salt can leech out their systems and needs to be replaced (I myself had problems with this when I used to run). I’m definitely not judging but a family like this looks very health conscious to me and I’m just wondering if salt reduction was a focus of theirs. Saying that, however, they were expert hikers so I’m sure they knew this. I’m mentioning it though for others to consider just in light of our increasingly hotter summers.

 

[LifeIsAMystery]

There are trail photos on FB soon after the fire. It really gives a sense of the terrain and how steep the switchbacks are.

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[Mamamerced]

Most media reports I've seen state that the mom was found less than 100 feet away from her husband. If she were truly racing to get help, she would have made it a lot farther than that.

I have no idea what happened, but I think the most plausible scenario is that someone in the family was in distress and they all stopped for an extended period of time. Everyone's condition then worsened while baking in the sun. At some point--perhaps several hours later--the wife was the only one of the two adults who was still conscious. In an extremely weakened state, she tried to hike up trail but collapsed after a few seconds of effort.

Again, I don't know what happened, but the fact that the wife only made it a few feet up the trail suggests that she was already extremely compromised by the time she decided to try to go for help.

Ellen could have gone ahead much earlier and dad, baby, dog caught up with deceased mom later on.

 

[d4i5y]

Here is a scenerio.. Dad is injuried, maybe sprains ankle halfway towards the end of the hike, Mom leaves to get help and dosen't make it, Dad decides since she didin't come back to go ahead and try to keep going with baby and dog, then stops where he is found from exhaustion and possibly can see his wife ahead where she is already down with heat stroke from racing to get help, that's why maybe she is found ahead of the rest of family and dog

This is such an interesting take. If I’m reading you right, your scenario is the dad was somehow incapacitated back towards the river in the valley, stayed behind, Ellen raced forward to get help. He then kept the baby and dog with him (it was her dog as seems from her Instagram so a risk of it running after her and getting lost/exhausted). Time goes by and he thinks something’s wrong. Makes the long, very slow, possibly painful walk up the trail, then sees her collapsed. He may then have simply collapsed himself possibly realising it was fatal, or perhaps too afraid to approach to confirm. Heat, dehydration, exhaustion, not thinking clearly then takes its toll.

There is one possible flaw in this scenario in that any ankle sprain would almost certainly be visibly treated (a compression bandage, say) but not necessarily. He was a big, fit guy and maybe a sock dipped in the cool water would’ve been enough. After all, they likely didn’t envisage him needing to put any weight on at that point.

Everything else tends to support it, though. The dog appears tethered to him likely to stop it running after her. There’s no express suggestion but she doesn’t appear to have carried anything on her other than a “phone and keys” (as I understand it). All indications are she was ahead in order to get help. The next question is why would she not have made it? Ok, she didn’t have water (that we know of), it was a very warm day, and a steep incline. But she was young, very fit, highly experienced, and all being well, it shouldn’t needed to have taken that long. So that then leads to the possibility something happened to her first. A previous underlying condition? A cardiac event? A muscle strain of her own? One assumes all these would be picked up in an autopsy but some might not, or maybe she was just suddenly overcome with exhaustion. Or perhaps she had spent a long time trying to get cellphone coverage moving back and forth on the peak as she didn’t want to leave her family for too long and then collapsed from panic, dehydration, heat stroke, etc.

Anyway, these are just my thoughts on that to share. That’s a very interesting and smart take, though, and shows the immense value of having many minds hit the same problem from lots of different angles. Apologies for the length!

 

[Figuring]

Most media reports I've seen state that the mom was found less than 100 feet away from her husband. If she were truly racing to get help, she would have made it a lot farther than that.

I have no idea what happened, but I think the most plausible scenario is that someone in the family was in distress and they all stopped for an extended period of time. Everyone's condition then worsened while baking in the sun. At some point--perhaps several hours later--the wife was the only one of the two adults who was still conscious. In an extremely weakened state, she tried to hike up trail but collapsed after a few seconds of effort.

Again, I don't know what happened, but the fact that the wife only made it a few feet up the trail suggests that she was already extremely compromised by the time she decided to try to go for help.

I keep thinking, what if the mom went much further ahead on the trail, it could have even been a km (just as an example), & panicked not seeing the end in sight, & came back? What if it's not that she only made it 30 yards away from them, but that she had been returning. Heatstroke can make people positively delirious, & she may have had enormous difficulty deciding the best course of action to take, & also psychologically it would have probably really difficult to choose to go too far away from her family, especially if one or more of the dad, baby & dog were in distress.

I wonder if there's footprints that may suggest anything like this.

This case is just so tragic.

 

[Auntie Cipation]

I agree completely. I suspect that not only is the heat more intense this year, such that even heat-hiking-familiar folks are being caught off guard, but that the smoke particulates in the air, visible or not, is reducing people's capabilities beyond their expectations.

MOO

Yes, this is what I've been saying too. The air is full of ash from all the fires near by. They been saying on the news to be careful outdoors due to the particles in the air and it affecting people's lungs.

A lady friend was saying how she took a trip to Visalia, about an hour away, and she had ash all over her windshield when she arrived.

The sky has been hazey too....

jmo

Yes it's bad where I am today too. I do think that when it's visibly smoky most people would know better than to exert themselves, especially without a quality facemask.

But on days that look relatively better this summer, people might feel like "finally! it's ok to go outside!" even though there is still a lot of not-obvious gunk in the air.

On another note, I really hope the investigators are scouring the couple of miles of trail BELOW where the family was found, for any signs of earlier distress: places where they may have stopped to rest, any remnants of feces or vomit etc, any places where the ground seems to indicate they may have stopped to tend to the baby or the dog (signs they poured water, changed or fed the baby, etc). Anything that might give a clue what happened, when they were last ok, when trouble struck, etc.

Even a note left behind might have happened at an earlier location -- such as if they then felt better and tried to move forward, but didn't get too far.

MOO

 

[LifeIsAMystery]

This is such an interesting take. If I’m reading you right, your scenario is the dad was somehow incapacitated back towards the river in the valley, stayed behind, Ellen raced forward to get help. He then kept the baby and dog with him (it was her dog as seems from her Instagram so a risk of it running after her and getting lost/exhausted). Time goes by and he thinks something’s wrong. Makes the long, very slow, possibly painful walk up the trail, then sees her collapsed. He may then have simply collapsed himself possibly realising it was fatal, or perhaps too afraid to approach to confirm. Heat, dehydration, exhaustion, not thinking clearly then takes its toll.

There is one possible flaw in this scenario in that any ankle sprain would almost certainly be visibly treated (a compression bandage, say) but not necessarily. He was a big, fit guy and maybe a sock dipped in the cool water would’ve been enough. After all, they likely didn’t envisage him needing to put any weight on at that point.

Everything else tends to support it, though. The dog appears tethered to him likely to stop it running after her. There’s no express suggestion but she doesn’t appear to have carried anything on her other than a “phone and keys” (as I understand it). All indications are she was ahead in order to get help. The next question is why would she not have made it? Ok, she didn’t have water (that we know of), it was a very warm day, and a steep incline. But she was young, very fit, highly experienced, and all being well, it shouldn’t needed to have taken that long. So that then leads to the possibility something happened to her first. A previous underlying condition? A cardiac event? A muscle strain of her own? One assumes all these would be picked up in an autopsy but some might not, or maybe she was just suddenly overcome with exhaustion. Or perhaps she had spent a long time trying to get cellphone coverage moving back and forth on the peak as she didn’t want to leave her family for too long and then collapsed from panic, dehydration, heat stroke, etc.

Anyway, these are just my thoughts on that to share. That’s a very interesting and smart take, though, and shows the immense value of having many minds hit the same problem from lots of different angles. Apologies for the length!

I think the elevation, 1400 feet back up a trail so steep it had switchbacks, played a huge role too. Had the path to the truck been downhill or less "aggressive" as LE termed the hike, the outcome could well have been different. She was only a little farther up the trail, still too low in the canyon to get any cell reception. Where they were found LE could not even use satellite phones, they had to hike out a way to connect. JMOO.

 

[RickshawFan]

Lots of reasons. The love of the trail. Conditioning. Meeting others. Experiencing something new. Research.

Bottom line, it can be done safely, if you know what you're doing.

IMO
If you calculate the amount of water required, added to the exertion it would take to carry that water, in the context of the ambient temperature (100+] enhanced by reflection from the trail surface, you don’t have a viable proposition.
There is no safety here, in those conditions. There was no safety already at 90 degrees.

 

[woods]

The Sheriff said Miju was in a kangaroo bag close to her father, but not tied to her father.

 

[katydid23]

The Sheriff said Miju was in a kangaroo bag close to her father, but not tied to her father.

"Law enforcement officers are now looking for other possible causes, including carbon monoxide poisoning, rattlesnake bites – although there is no evidence on their bodies – and even a possible heat wave.

Park officials said on Saturday that heatstroke caused the death of a hiker in Death Valley on Wednesday, when the temperature was 42°C."

 

[d4i5y]

I think the elevation, 1400 feet back up a trail so steep it had switchbacks, played a huge role too. Had the path to the truck been downhill or less "aggressive" as LE termed the hike, the outcome could well have been different. She was only a little farther up the trail, still too low in the canyon to get any cell reception. Where they were found LE could not even use satellite phones, they had to hike out a way to connect. JMOO.

Definitely. This is a screen cap of a 3D Google maps of where it looks like they were found (as I understand it from a map I saw on the first thread). That’s an extremely arduous hike in that kind of heat even for someone experienced I should think. Someone panicked, increasingly dehydrated, with possible heat exhaustion or heat stroke - easy to see them collapsing. It’s gutting looking at it though and thinking if only she’d been able to get to the ridge, it wasn’t that much further. I do think there’s a strong possibility though she wasn’t aiming for the car but actually trying to get phone coverage so she could call emergency services then head back down. I can see that reasoning - she just wanted to call in help then get back to her famiIy she loved. It’s just not easy to understand why she didn’t make it up. Or maybe she did and was returning having spent a long time trying to get a signal. Logic says she would’ve gone for the car then but perhaps she was too dehydrated/not thinking clearly by that point. It’s all so sad to think about.

 

[RickshawFan]

The Sheriff said Miju was in a kangaroo bag close to her father, but not tied to her father.

A kangaroo bag is very different from the kind of baby carrier we’ve been assuming.

 

[MaryG12]

But why even do it? Just wait until it's cooler. Hiking is 100°F/38°C temperatures is foolhardy, even with lots of water, cool rags and many breaks. It sounds like torture, not something that is supposed to be enjoyable. People need to respect their bodies and the dangers of heat more.

I have to wonder why they took the dog, and the baby out in 100 degree temperature. Did they even have sunblock with them? I've experienced what happens when not wearing sunblock while hiking in Florida and frankly, it's not worth it.

 

[bpeterson912]

I keep thinking, what if the mom went much further ahead on the trail, it could have even been a km (just as an example), & panicked not seeing the end in sight, & came back? What if it's not that she only made it 30 yards away from them, but that she had been returning.

That's possible, but it seems unlikely to me. The family was found a little over 2 kilometers from the trail head. If Ellen had the energy to make it a kilometer up the trail--and if she still had the energy to walk a full kilometer back to the family--you would think she would try to continue to the car to get help.

Also, any scenario that involves Ellen hiking alone for an extended distance and then returning has to explain why she would stop 30 yards away from her family. I mean, it's theoretically possible that she walked a kilometer up the trail, walked 970 meters back, and then just happened to collapse 30 meters short of her goal of returning to her family--but that scenario seems far less plausible than the one in which she tries to leave to get help but is too exhausted to make it more than a few yards.

 

[RickshawFan]

I agree with this. Also, my mother grew up in East Africa and every time we would go for holidays, she made us drink a small glass of orange juice with salt and sugar every morning with breakfast. I know there are better drinks now but I often think on how many people who exercise a lot don’t realise how salt can leech out their systems and needs to be replaced (I myself had problems with this when I used to run). I’m definitely not judging but a family like this looks very health conscious to me and I’m just wondering if salt reduction was a focus of theirs. Saying that, however, they were expert hikers so I’m sure they knew this. I’m mentioning it though for others to consider just in light of our increasingly hotter summers.

You might be on the right track with electrolyte imbalance… It doesn’t sound like the family had much water carrying capacity, but I wonder if they were replenishing electrolytes at all? Personally, I need Gatorade or similar when I’m hiking or hot, and there’s no way I’m hiking above 90, so I don’t have experience what it looks like if you have an electrolyte issue. Anyone?

 

[MaryG12]

I joined specifically for this case. I cannot get it out of my head. It’s not that far from me, it’s just so tragic, and so many unknowns and twists and turns. You can’t help but try to fill in the blanks to bring some type of explanation to the whole horrendous thing!

I read in a Mariposa mountain community comment thread that the dad had gotten lost (maybe that is speculation because how would someone know that…). Regardless, if you look at the Savage-Lundy trail near Devil’s Gulch on Google Earth, it’s steep terrain headed back up. Our heat here and in Yosemite Valley, is dry dry dry and at 107/109 nobody should be out in it, much less hiking. They were near the river at times while on the trail, but in some places it was inaccessible. And perhaps they were concerned about the algae mats and consuming the water. My first thought was something sinister, but Imo think heat exposure/exhaustion/stroke is very likely. Something happened to alter the hike as others here have said, baby got sick, dog got sick, lost off trail (after fire…terrain looks similar) and they were in the heat longer than anticipated. But so many…what ifs, and assumptions.

You are all brilliant btw! And so respectful and thoughtful in your posts! I should’ve joined sooner.

Welcome to Websleuths!

What is the elevation of the area where they went hiking? Going by photos I have seen of the trail online it does not look like there is much shade at all on the trail.

 

[NSamuelle]

A kangaroo bag is very different from the kind of baby carrier we’ve been assuming.

That struck me as well; it isn’t very “structured” so the baby would probably be lying on the ground once Jonathan removed the kangaroo bag from his body. If she was still in the bag and not lying against the fabric I wonder if they thought heat was an issue for her (i.e., why leave her wrapped up in the bag if it was?).

 

[bpeterson912]

You might be on the right track with electrolyte imbalance… It doesn’t sound like the family had much water carrying capacity, but I wonder if they were replenishing electrolytes at all? Personally, I need Gatorade or similar when I’m hiking or hot, and there’s no way I’m hiking above 90, so I don’t have experience what it looks like if you have an electrolyte issue. Anyone?

I think it would take more than a few hours of walking in hot weather before an electrolyte imbalance would incapacitate an otherwise healthy person. It's possible, but heat stroke seems far more likely.

 

[Smokingun]

Welcome to Websleuths!

What is the elevation of the area where they went hiking? Going by photos I have seen of the trail online it does not look like there is much shade at all on the trail.

Thank you!
It looks like a difference of 1500 feet between bottom of switchbacks to the gate. FYI, the attached is from the app All Trails and I used the adjacent trail Hites Cove to look up the trail where they were found.