A Brooklyn man who had to call the emergency services twice in two days of hiking in Arizona offered a warning to other hikers, saying: “Life isn’t worth losing for a cool Instagram picture.”
Philip Vasto, 28, called 911 on 2 March when he found himself lost on Humphreys Peak, north of Flagstaff in central Arizona. He called the emergency services a second time the following day.
Mr Vasto is an “independent contractor” who has described himself as an “experienced hiker”, according to the Arizona Daily Sun.
He was in Phoenix for work when he decided he would try to summit the tallest peak in the state, standing at 12,633 feet (3,850m). The trail to the top is more than 10 miles long and rises more than 3,000 feet.
According to Mr Vasto’s online research, he estimated it would take between two and three hours to reach the top. But he hadn’t accounted for the amount of snow on the trails at this time of year.
He started his first attempt to reach the top at 2.30pm on 2 March, quickly starting to struggle to find the start of the trail underneath the snow. After finding the trailhead, it remained difficult to navigate the snow.
“It was very easy to get off the trail and fall into the snow,” Mr Vasto told the Arizona Daily Sun.
Mr Vasto didn’t have a light source, so when darkness began to fall, he became worried about finding his way. He called 911 at around 6.50pm to say that he was lost on the trail but that he was attempting to find his way back.
The Coconino County Sheriff’s Office Search and Rescue Unit found that Mr Vasto was near Humphreys Trail at an elevation of around 10,600 feet (3,230m).
According to the paper, Sgt Aaron Dick said they spoke to Mr Vasto about the importance of hiking with the right equipment and planning ahead. He said they told Mr Vasto to come back in a few months when the conditions would be better.
But at 9am the next morning, Mr Vasto was back at it.
“I was thinking if I start early in the morning, I’ll have all the time in the world to reach the summit,” he told the paper.
Mr Vasto met two other hikers on the trial, husband and wife Jonathan and Alberta O’neill. They decided to turn around at 3.30pm when they still hadn’t reached the top.
“I definitely did not want to get caught on the mountain past dark,” Mr O’neill told the Arizona Daily Sun. “I decided that we had to put ego aside, respect the mountain and get down safe.”
Around 15 minutes after the couple had turned around, Mr Vasto came to the same decision.
“The reason why I turned back, what was slowing me down so much, was just how powerful the wind was blowing,” Mr Vasto said. He estimated that the gusts of wind reached about 25 mph. “It was an incredibly, incredibly violent gust.”
On his way down, Mr Vasto fell, sustaining abrasions to his leg. He started to feel light-headed and “numb all over”.
With only five per cent of his phone battery remaining, Mr Vasto called for search and rescue a second time at around 5pm.
“I did not know just how cold it would be to be up there at that time of year,” Mr Vasto said. “I decided, at the very minimum, let me call somebody because that way they can at least know that I’m out here.”
“It was very apparent that he wasn’t prepared for the climate that he had gotten himself into,” fellow hiker Phillip Wyatt told the outlet, adding that that Vasto seemed to be completely exhausted. “I don’t think he was physically capable of getting back down before sunset.”
Coconino County Search and Rescue asked for help from the Arizona Department of Public Safety Northern Air Rescue Unit and a helicopter was sent to retrieve Mr Vasto and Mr Wyatt, who had decided to stay with the 28-year-old.
Mr Vasto was “encouraged to not attempt the hike again” by the search and rescue team.
“One of the potential pitfalls of the technology is that people take a shortcut and don’t spend as much time preparing, gathering info or building up their skills to be sufficient in these kinds of austere environments,” Sgt Dick told the Arizona Daily Sun. “They know that if things don’t go well, or they’re not enjoying themselves and it’s not working out the way they wanted to, they can push a button, make a call and summon assistance quickly.”
“I don’t think the technology is all bad,” he added. “Responsible use of the technology is the thing we want to get across.”
“The nice thing about mountains and canyons is that they will be here next week, next month, next year,” he said, adding that incidents like this most often occur when people show an “unwillingness to back down”.
“I highly advise NOT attempting Humphreys Peak in the winter,” Mr Vasto wrote in a post on Instagram. “It was arguably scarier and more dangerous than Kilamanjaro at this time of year. I’m not ashamed of turning back. After all, life isn’t worth losing for a cool Instagram picture. Part of being a hiker is realizing your own human limitations and respecting the mountain and the climate.”
The paper noted that search and rescue operations in Arizona cost about $1,000 an hour and are funded by the state’s taxpayers.
The Daily Sun asked Mr Vasto why he didn’t include his calls to the emergency services in his telling of the story on social media.
“We make posts on social media about how we want others to see us,” he said, adding that he was worried the full details would lead to judgement.
On the AllTrails app, Mr Vasto wrote in a review that hikers should “wait for warmer months before attempting” to summit Humphreys Peak.
Mr Vasto is planning to have another go at the trail in May alongside Mr Wyatt.
“I really respect Phil’s perseverance,” Mr Wyatt said. “I hope that he’s able to make it to the top sometime.”
