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NEWS > U.S.A. > CLIMBER UNEXPECTEDLY DIES AFTER FALLING INTO VOLCANO
CLIMBER UNEXPECTEDLY DIES AFTER FALLING INTO VOLCANO
February 17 2010
Mount St. Helens, WA – No matter our technological advances, no matter our extended life spans, no matter our dominance of the natural world, we are still very much at the whims of the planet when it comes to natural disasters. The earthquake 
that hit Haiti in January, as an example, could have been mitigated by better infrastructure and wealth, but the country would still have been devastated. A similar incident happen in 2005 when Hurricane Katrina hit a city in the wealthiest nation that has ever existed, killing thousands and doing untold damage. When nature unleashes her fury, even man is helpless.
There is perhaps no other natural disaster quite as spectacular or potentially as destructive as that of an erupting volcano. Spewing out ash and magma that can kill a human in seconds, unleashing toxic gases from the belly of the planet, a volcano is truly nature’s fury unleashed. The ancient Roman city of Pompeii felt that fury, as did the people around Mount Tambora, 71,000 of whom died when that mountain erupted in 1815. Approximately 70,000 years ago one the largest volcanic explosions occurred at modern day Lake Toba, Indonesia, releasing up to a gigaton’s worth of TNT and nearly ran our species to extinction. Of all natural disasters, the volcano is undoubtedly the most dangerous so it is perfectly reasonable to expect that when a person falls into one, they will die, which is exactly what happened to a Washington State man on Tuesday.
“He had handed his camera to another climber and was about to pose for a picture with Mount Rainier in the background when he turned around and took a final step on the cornice,” fellow climber Scott Salkovics told CNN. “Boom, it busted off and I saw him clawing for the edge with a startled look on his face, and then he disappeared.”
After a frantic search for the climber, 52-year old Joseph Bohlig, his body was discovered and extracted via a U.S. Naval helicopter. Warnings about unstable footing and the dangers of falling into a massive volcano are posted all around the site. Mount St. Helens last erupted in 1980, killing 57 and destroying 240 square kilometres of forest.
“Hiking is natively a dangerous sport no matter where you are. A bad step, weak footing, anything can really happen and cause a lot of damage and a lot of injury and so people really need to be cautious. That is especially true when you are hiking along the snow covered precipice overlooking a giant chasm that reaches down to the Earth’s core,” said Scrape TV Medical analyst Dr. Phillip Waites. “I can’t tell you number of injuries I have seen from slips and falls and how truly devastating they can be. When you are talking about someone falling a great distance, falling on jagged rock, falling deeper and deeper into the planet there is a very good chance that serious injury and even death can occur, which seems to be the case here.”
Bohlig was apparently an experienced climber and friends and family stated that they couldn’t believe this had happened, which rarely does much to prevent death after falling onto solid rock from great heights.
“The simple fact of the matter is most people who have fallen into open volcanoes, which admittedly are few, end up dying. No matter how incredible the event may or may not be, the harsh reality is not believing something can happen rarely does anything to prevent serious head trauma or spinal cord injury,” continued Waites. “Generally the best advice to people wanting to avoid dying from falling into an open volcano is to simply not go near one. The closer you get to the mouth of the volcano, the greater the likelihood that you will fall in and, ultimately, die from that fall. Just stay away.”
It’s not believed that Bohlig had any good reason to be on the volcano, such as dropping a magic ring inside, making his death even more unbelievable.
Mike Michaels, American Correspondent
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