Photo: US National Park Service rescues hiker lost for more than a week in Texas park
Twenty-five-year-old Christy Perry survives alone in Big Bend National Park, an area of 1,200 square miles, after drinking rainwater.
A woman has been missing for more than a week while hiking in the western national park. A Texas man who resorted to drinking rainwater to prevent dehydration or worse was found alive and rescued Friday, federal officials said.
A hiker drank from a puddle and ate tadpoles to survive his ordeal in the Texas desert. .More
Christy Perry, 25, survived getting lost in the 1,200-square-mile (3,108-square-kilometer) Big Bend National Park, which made national headlines in June when a teenage boy died after falling ill while hiking with 119F temperatures (48.3C). The boy's stepfather was then killed after crashing his car during a desperate search for help.
Authorities say Perry, of Houston, rented the car from the west Texas community. from Midland on November 8 and parked the next day at the Big Bend Lost Mine Trailhead, about 240 miles (386 km) away.
That evening she did not show up at her reserved campsite in the Chisos Basin and did not return home.
Perry did not share details of her trip with people who knew her, but apparently traveled to Big Bend for a planned vacation, Texas television news outlet KTRK reported. With Perry still missing as of Wednesday, park rangers, federal border agents, firefighters and the Texas Public Safety Agency launched a search for her.
They found Perry. “Woke and talking” about a quarter mile (400 meters) below the Lost Mine Trailhead about 9:30 a.m. Friday, the National Park Service said in a statement. The state Department of Public Safety then flew her away from the scene by helicopter for medical examination in Odessa, near Midland.
Video provided by a park visitor to KTRK shows Perry's rescuers helping her off the helicopter and into a waiting ambulance. She was wearing a yellow helmet and appeared to move slowly as she was assisted by officers standing at her sides.
The National Park Service said Perry had no food and quickly ran. came out of the water after getting lost, Houston TV station KHOU reported. The agency said she drank rainwater to stay hydrated.
It's unclear how Perry became disoriented on the Lost Mine Trail, a 4.8-mile roundtrip route. .7 km), which ABC News notes rises steeply through the rugged terrain and forests of the Chisos Mountains. But a hiking guide named Jennifer McCann told KHOU that it was foggy the day Perry went hiking, and that may have contributed to her disappearance.
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Perry's ordeal ended days after Texas Highways reported on an Austin marketing executive who drank from a puddle and ate tadpoles to survive heat exhaustion and became lost for more than a day. while hiking through the eponymous but separate Big Bend Ranch State Park.
Both Perry and marketing executive Jeff Hahn were able to defy the fates faced by other hikers who found themselves in danger. . Texas state and national parks have reported at least a half-dozen heat-related deaths this summer, the Hahn report noted.
Meanwhile, in late October, a 71-year-old -an old hiker was found dead next to his still-living dog after both went missing while hiking Mount Colorado in August.
According to KHOU, experts believe… That people hiking in West Texas pack accordingly and keep your loved ones informed of the details of your route in case something goes wrong.
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