Ed Rosenthal – 6 Days in the Desert
Time stranded: 6 days
Distance traveled: >100 miles
Terrain types: desert
Deaths: 0
Situation ended: Rescue by helicopter
Location: Joshua Tree National Park, California
Ed Rosenthal is one of the only people I’ve heard of who wrote his own poetry book on his survival experience. It contains 36 poems that detail how he got lost, almost died and how he was finally rescued, re-igniting his faith in religion.
Ed was a keen hiker who enjoyed a long walk through the desert every once in a while, and in September of 2010, he left on one such journey. The route he planned to walk was one he’d done many times before and was a little over 4 miles so he only took a small amount of water with him.
At some point along the route, he decided to take a turn off into a canyon, later stating at a press conference “I don’t know why I did it”. He walked for a few miles in this new direction, taking various turns around sharp canyon corners and walking in whichever direction seemed nice at the time.
As it started to get dark he realized he was horribly lost, attempting to retrace his steps and only ending up somewhere he’d never been before. He thought his best option would be to stay put and wait for someone to come looking for him, since he didn’t know which direction to walk in he didn’t want to risk getting even more lost.
His water quickly ran out and any energy he had left was sapped away by the beaming sun, forcing him to try and drink his own urine, which he couldn’t stomach and didn’t attempt again.
After a couple of days, he was close to dying of thirst, so he started to pray for rain, and luckily for him in one of the driest areas of North America it rained later that day, convincing him that his prayers were answered. He drank as much as could and had a small supply which formed on the ground to last him for another day.
After 4 days of waiting around in a canyon, his water supply ran out just before dark and he was convinced he was going to die. He had made several signal fires up until this point with the little wood he found lying around the canyon floor, but after his wood ran out and no one came, it only added to his certainty of not making it.
He spent the next day carving messages into one of the walls, including messages to his family and a brief will. After ending his notes with a small poem he lay down and tried to go to sleep, convinced he may not wake up and if he did, it would mean another day of suffering before the end.
He was reported missing less than 24 hours after he left, and search teams had been sent out over the next couple of days but with no luck. On day 6 he was lying down on the canyon floor too weak to move, and out of pure luck, a rescue helicopter flew directly head over.
He was taken straight to the hospital where apart from being dehydrated and a little sunburned was otherwise fine. In a later interview, he vowed never to go hiking through the region again.