09/21/2026
THE GREATEST HAZARD ON YOUR HIKE MAY BE YOU
We spend a lot of time talking about hazards in the mountains. We talk about weather, terrain, navigation, darkness, heat and cold. We tell people to carry the Essentials, check the forecast, download their maps, carry a communication device and leave a trip plan.
All of those things matter, but there is another unseen hazard we don't talk about nearly enough: YOU. Let's face it, we can be our own worst enemies. Our judgment can be influenced by ego, emotion and cognitive biases that we may not even recognize in ourselves.
Your physical and mental condition is one of the most important things you need to manage in the mountains. That means having enough self-awareness to recognize how fatigue, fear, pain, preparation, experience and even your own ego may be influencing the decisions you make throughout the day.
The hardest part is acting on what you recognize. Has the objective begun to exceed your ability or experience? Are you still making sound decisions? Are you continuing because it remains reasonable to do so, or because you simply don't want to turn around?
The mountains will change around you, but the most important variable you can actually control is yourself. Two recent rescues illustrate why that self-awareness matters.
WHEN THE WARNING SIGNS ARE ALREADY THERE
We recently rescued a hiker from high on Brunswick Mountain who was experiencing severe knee pain. Earlier in the day, other hikers had encouraged him to turn around because his knee was already hurting. He continued upward.
As the day progressed, the warning signs accumulated. His knee became increasingly painful, he ran out of water, he did not have a headlamp, his phone battery was dropping and daylight was disappearing.
Most concerningly, he reportedly told another hiker that "if he couldn't make it, he would simply call Search and Rescue."
Eventually, that's exactly what happened.
By the time he called 911, his situation had changed considerably. He was alone high on a mountain, in significant pain, without water or a headlamp, with very little phone battery remaining and darkness approaching. At that point, calling for help was the correct decision.
The lesson isn't that he shouldn't have called. The lesson is that there were opportunities much earlier in the day to make a different decision. So why didn't he? The warning signs weren't hidden; they were accumulating in front of him.
This is where summit fever and continuation bias can take over. Continuation bias is our tendency to stick with the original plan even when changing circumstances are telling us to reconsider it. The more time and effort we've invested, and the closer we feel to our goal, the harder it can become to turn around.
We are all susceptible to it. Self-awareness means recognizing when this is happening in our own thinking and being willing to interrupt it before manageable problems begin to stack up.
SAR IS THE SAFETY NET, NOT THE PLAN
The safety ecosystem around outdoor recreation has changed enormously.
Today, cell coverage reaches farther into the mountains, satellite communicators can summon assistance from remote locations and newer smartphones can communicate by satellite. We can tell people to “call early” because, increasingly, people are able to reach us before a situation becomes critical.
That is an extraordinary improvement in backcountry safety.
But our rescuers are volunteers, and helicopters, police, ambulance services and other emergency resources are finite. Rescuers will absolutely be there when they are needed, they should not be treated as a substitute for preparation, judgment and personal responsibility.
SAR should not be your primary plan. We are the emergency safety net when a properly prepared trip plan fails.
BE PRESENT
Another example of this lesson came from Stanislav Volo after his extraordinary six-day survival experience near Squamish.
When we sat down with Stanislav afterward and asked him what he would do differently, his answer wasn't primarily about equipment. He told us that he would be more present.
Stanislav was an occasional hiker. He had underestimated the objective and the environment from the beginning. Being relatively close to the city of Squamish and the Sea to Sky Gondola gave him a sense that he wasn't venturing particularly far into the wilderness.
But proximity to a city doesn't make the mountains less wild.
As he travelled up the logging road, he listened to an audiobook through his earbuds. Looking back, he felt disconnected from his surroundings and wasn't fully paying attention to the terrain, his environment or the decisions he was making as he moved farther into unfamiliar terrain.
His reflection was striking: he felt that he had failed before the trip really began because his mindset was wrong. He had underestimated the day and, more importantly, underestimated the mountains.
There is an important lesson in that. Do not underestimate nature simply because civilization appears close. Mountains do not become less consequential because you can see a city, a highway or a gondola nearby.
Preparedness isn't simply about owning the right things. You can carry a headlamp, first-aid kit, satellite communicator, extra clothing and navigation app and still make poor decisions. Technology can help you navigate and summon assistance, but it cannot tell you when your judgment is deteriorating or when it is time to abandon an objective.
CHECK YOURSELF AS OFTEN AS YOU CHECK YOUR MAP
Throughout a trip, periodically stop and consider how you and your group are actually doing. Are you where you expected to be? Are you moving at the pace you anticipated? Do you still have enough daylight, food, water and battery to complete the trip safely? If not, turn around.
Pay attention when someone begins hurting or slowing down. Notice when the weather deteriorates, navigation becomes uncertain or the group's energy changes. Think about what happens if you continue for another hour, because every kilometre travelled farther into the mountains is another kilometre you may eventually need to travel back out.
You also need to ask yourself one of the hardest questions in outdoor decision-making: Am I continuing because this is still a good decision, or because I don't want to give up? Remember things like continuation bias, escalation of commitment, and the sunk cost fallacy - they are often affecting you.
Turning around is not failure. Changing the objective is not failure. Stopping to eat, drink, warm up, check the map or reconsider the plan is not weakness. These are all examples of actively managing risk and yourself.
SELF-AWARENESS
Pay attention to your body and your state of mind, and check in with the people around you. Recognize small problems while they are still small, make decisions early and give yourself permission to change the plan.
Emergencies in the backcountry are rarely the result of one single thing going wrong. More often, they develop through an accumulation of smaller problems that are missed, ignored or allowed to compound until the situation becomes much harder to manage.
The mountains are dynamic, but so are you. Learning to recognize when the environment is changing, when you are changing, and when those smaller problems are beginning to stack up may be one of the most important backcountry skills you ever develop.
The greatest hazard on your hike may be you, and self-awareness may be one of the most important pieces of safety equipment you carry.
