Anyone know of a good emergency kit for kids hiking over a weekend?

Where are they hiking? Day trips or overnight? Is there cellphone coverage? Do they have the basics covered, food, potable water, cooking?

Of course not. See below**.

I guess you mean space blanket, reflective mylar or whatever. A real blanket would be too heavy.

If there is cell phone coverage, that seems like enough, especially since each one of them will have a separate cell phone. If there is cellphone signal where they are going, a radio might be nice, but someone could listen to the radio before they leave to see if snow is predicted this summer morning, or a mud slide. Whistle is good, small, loud. We never had one

Some comments you can take for what they are worth. I was VP for a couple years, then pres for about 6 years, of an outdoors club in Maryland. I was also activities chair for a couple years while I was prez. We did something outdoors maybe 48 Sundays a year, every year, within 2 hours of Baltimore. We also had people from DC come to many. Most were hikes but we did occasional horseback riding (at a farm where they did not let us gallop), trap shooting, iirc pistol shooting, trip to the National Arboretum, (We should have gone to the zoo), ice skating

We never thought to bring a first-aid kit, not until tonight.

(As an aside, earlier in NYCity I did a few things with American Youth Hostels, that had a store in Soho in NYC and ran weekends sometimes. One was an endurance hike, just east of the Deleware River, starting in NYS and going to NJ near the Delaware Water Gap. We were spread out so I didn't see this in person, but someone did get seriously hurt. Most people were in their 20's and 30's but the one who took charge was 16 years old. He told them what to do and I think he went, to the highway I guess, and got help. I saw him later riding his bike on Houston St. in NYC and he looked like a child, but there must have been something special about him. I wish I knew his name to see what he ended up doing.)

One event I tried to arrange but could not was in the spring when the Hanover Shoe Horse Farm just over the border in Pennsylvania, the largest breeder of standard-bred horses in the USA, had many foals being born. I wanted us to go and watch, and the Horse Farm didn't say no, but they also said most births took place at night. I guess that's true if they say so, and it was too hard to arrange. I didn't even get to watch one myself.

I always told people that any hike where no one died was a success, but in fact, no one was ever injured. Really.

Of course we were not teenagers (except for 2 of us, and only on1 of the two was "reckless" ***) but in our 30's, 20's, 40's. We were an outdoor club, not a singles club, but most people who came were single. One urban hike that was flat had a mother and her small son.

We had everyone sign a release at the start of each event, in theory because we were a club, we charged very modest dues, and $2 for each men for non-members. I don't remember if we had a bank account, proably, but we were incoroporated and we had officers, who might have gotten sued if something went wrong, especially the activities chairman, the president, and whoever was running that particular event. Sometimes all 3 were me. People ridiculed the release. even though it was copied from some professionally written one in Maryland, saying it wouldn't stop a lawsuit. Maybe not. I considered it important not so much for its legal value but as a reminder to each person signing that he was responsible for his own safety, he shouldn't do something he considereed too dangerous just because the trip leader or the others were, or because they said it was okay. Maybe you could adapt that somehow, as a mutual compact. NO one should tell another, "Don't worry. You won't fall" and especially not, "I'll catch you if you do". I never heard anyone say such things either, but we were not teenagers.

What sort of terrain are we talking about, Yosemite or Central Park? How far from civilization.

obligatory reminder: Under FCC regs, if the cellphone and tower are electronically compatable, then the phone can make "911 calls" even if there's no active account with that carrier.

Hence... (for example): if the phone is registered with Acme Cellular but there's no coverage by them in that area, but there is by Road Runner, then calls to "911" _will_ be routed through ok.

However, they WON'T be able to call you... just 911.

Oh, my personal recommendation is a Very Pistol, aka Flare Gun, but that's just because I think they're cool.

This was the time we had our own small island within the park and it was very hot and humid all night, and went to a smaller sub-island and slept totally naked all night, with no covering. Because it was so hot. One has to learn how to sleep without a top cover and it's even harder to learn to sleep naked at the same time, and even harder to do it in public.

No one teased me in the morning so I presume they were all sleeping when I was.

There used to be Hanover Shoe stores around here, HQed in Hanover Pa., one of several nearby towns named after cities in Germany, but they closed years ago.

How many horses does Hanover Shoe Farms own? It only took about 50 years for the Hanover Shoe Farms to grow from a single building on a small farm to a conglomeration of 27 farms, 3,000 acres, 12,000 horses, 40 barns, 35 houses and over 100 employees. The methods used to breed these spectacular horses have been kept up-to-date and are as modern as possible.

Standard-bred means they are used for harness racing, as opposed to thorough-bred. Horse farms are common around here, as well as fox-hunts, which used to be and maybe still are weekly. Although they don't kill the fox and one cynic told me drinking was a major aspect of the event. One area is named Hunt Valley. Plus they have occasional steeple-chases. I went to one, but it takes 30 seconds for all the horses to run by. No one invited us to eat or drink, so one was enough. You can see how the wooden fence is set back about 20 feet and about 20 feet wide where the race course crosses a road, so that when the horses jump over the fence, they are pushing off from ground, not pavement.

There can never be cellphone coverage assured on any hike but they will have a solar charger & avenza software with USGS geopdfs preloaded.

They have a compass & food & tents but they never use a fire due to the fire danger (plus a fire is never needed in the temperature out here).

They won't have sleeping bags but they will bring closed-cell foam mats.

Cooking isn't necessary. They're following a series of streams to their terminus, where each stream is about ten to fifteen miles long along rugged mountains with nobody living near the canyons except at the final downstream mile or two of the streams - but they will be hiking upstream.

Absolute worst case they can purify water with bleach but they've been drinking the stream water since they were ten year olds as it's nowhere near people or industry.

My problem is they're not thinking of emergencies, like rattlesnake bites, broken legs, tourniquets, SOS calls, etc., so I want to get them a kit.

Good point. That confused me the first time I came across it on my phone. I didn't know about it and didn't know what my phone was implying.

I also forgot that I read an article recently, although it was probably planted by the makers of the map software, that said that people should not rely on Google maps for trails in the woods. Instead it gave the names of two apps that had better, vetted maps. Topo something and something else. One more reason I think the whole article was an advertisement is that it didnt' mention the app I use, AllTrails. or All Trails.

For free, you can use all the features except downloading maps to your phone. So if you're sure you'll have cell coverage you can just use the map online. If you want to download the map, you have to join, but it's not very expensive. Especially if there is a group and only one needs to have the map. Then I think in t he year you belong you can dl lots of maps that will still work even after your membership has expired, but if not, you can rejoin in a feww minutes.

The maps will show where you are on the map, like google maps does, but I think you can zoom in a lot farther.

Plus they have loads of hiking trails arond here, from river gorges to little more than baseball fields that are surrounded by a flat trail. There's one or two of those, and the webpage helps you to find all the nearby trails. It gives an elevation change graph and just about anything you'd ever want. Can't recommend All Trails too highly. But I've also used google maps and I think if you understand how maps work, that it may not show every trail, it's good enough.

(I was proud that on threeoccasions or more I took the club to places that had no trail or the only trails were deer trails. Strangely, no one on those hikes expressed special pleasure in this fact and some clearly did not like it. I brought a machete to cut our way through the thorns that grow up ecross deer trails if there aren't enough deer. On another occasion I read that Crown State Hospital in Crownsville Maryland was going to sell off about half of its extensive land, hundreds of acres, for housing, and I thought we should hike it while it was forest. We carpooled and had about 5 carloads and when we parked, some guy came out to talk to us, wanted to know why we were there. It turned out there was/is a nudist colony across the road from the forest and he was afraid we'd come to look at them. We didn't even know about it, but now we wanted to look at them. But that would be another day.

So we went on the hike but one or two lawyers had noticed the No Trespassing signs a couple hundred feet down the road and they got all upset. I told them to say we were prospective buyers. :-) but even though no one else even noticed we were there, afterwards they complained to the annoyilng woman who by this time was president. No one will get in trouble for trespassing by hiking on vacant land that is about to be sold, and even if one did get in trouble, you can't get disbarred unless you betray a client. No one cares if you're hiking on public, or even private, property, especially since they could say I told them where to go.

And apparently the mental hospital could not sell the land and now it's used for hiking and (ugh) biking, with blazed trails. Gets 4.7 stars on

I haven't been back to the nudist colony. It gets 4.2 stars on 75 reviews.

Crownsvile was the only mental hospital in Maryland for colored people, when Maryland was segregated. I wouldn't have moved here if it still were. The part they tried to sell is the great majority of what's left of I-97 on this map: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Crownsville,+MD/@39.0101561,-76.6140191,2232m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x89b7f05f7b34dbb5:0xafd643b67869f043!8m2!3d39.0284438!4d-76.6013536!16zL20vMHR0YnM?hl=en&entry=ttuhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crownsville_Hospital_Center>Hence... (for example): if the phone is registered with Acme Cellular

I understand.

The weapon of last resort in some adventure movies.

In my lifetime first aid for snake bites has mostly become a list of 'don't'. No cutting, sucking, tourniquets, and so forth, mostly calm.

Supposedly the later models of iPhone can transmit a SOS via satellite. You might want to look into that. inReach and other sat devices are spendy.

A few regular bandaids, gauze, and so forth can't hurt and regular Ace bandages for sprains. A broken leg would be rough. Depending on the nature of the fracture a field expedient splint might work. Maybe some moleskin for blisters.

Some loperamide may be welcome if the drinking water isn't as pristine as could be wished. I prefer Polar Pure for iffy water. He was shut down for a while because iodine crystals can be used to make meth, yadayada but I thin it's back. Ain't nothing like finding a dead coyote a half mile upstream.

I'm assuming flash floods aren't a problem. There's not much you can do about those except get out of the canyon when it starts raining. That's easier said than done sometimes.

Most first aid kits have a lot of useless junk. I just put everything into a ditty sack and call it good.

If it's that hot blankets are probably not needed. A passing cold front might leave you wet and miserable but it's not life threatening.

True, but in many of the areas where I hike there is no cellphone coverage. Some dead areas are surprisingly close to civilization but if you're on the wrong side of a mountain or in a canyon you're out of luck.

That works as long as there are no mosquitoes, black flies, no-see-ums, kissing bugs, horse flies, and other insects that want to drain you dry.

You presume a LOT! Others, not so much.

Bear country ? French Alps ? Gobi desert ? Peru ? Australia ?

... sometimes the little details matter ..

Heat exhaustion has killed a couple of hikers this year. .. a cautious careful brain might be the best take-along but college kids aren't known for that. John T.

In my deer hunting days, things I had in my pack were cell phone, Etrex gps, compass and two led flashlights. Besides band aids and tissue, which could be used as tp, I carried a pack of wound seal powder to stop instant bleeding. I might have drank stream water in the past but today might get one of those small filters to be safe.

The two apps recommended in that article were Caltopo and Gaia GPS

It wasn't an ad that recommendd them. I recalled incorrectly. It was this article: Hikers Rescued After Following Nonexistent Trail on Google Maps Did I post the link earlier? Here is a free link for everyone, good for

The group said “it is simply not appropriate” to use apps such as Google Maps for the wilderness, though apps specifically designed for trails, such as CalTopo and Gaia GPS, were acceptable.

People can submit suggested edits to Google Maps for wrong or missing data. Google does not provide a timeline for how long it takes to process those suggestions. It was unclear how the nonexistent trail had appeared on Google Maps in the first place."

Of course this is a rescue unit talking and they see the worst examples, but otoh, who wants to be worst example. They don't comment on All Trails, but about it....

Where you are at that moment. You can search for maps on the PC but if you want one in the phone where it can help you, you have to find it again with the phone, with the app, and dl it again. Otherwise you have to bring the computer along.

I haven't heard anything lately but Google had designed a man portable unit similar to what they use on the streets to gather trail data. Compared to driving around in a van that's a lot of work so I would assume popular trails in national parks and so forth would get covered first.

I've seen places where they used a man-carried camera to do street view, the Old City of Jerusalem is the only one I rmemeber. Plus I've seen bicycle trails.

But nothing in the USA have I noticed.

As to corrections, they had the street numbers wrong on my O shaped street. They had one address correct but then went CCW instead of CW to make the numbers bigger. After I filled out their short form on the map, it took less than 2 weeks for them to correct it.

OTOH, street view can't see my house, for the same reason people in cars can't see my house. I'm tucked off to the left. Even people who live on the same street often don't know I'm here. No problem except when I ordered a rose bush. Fedex said it couldn't be delivered, house was vacant. I think that's because the house next to mine, which is what shows in street view when they put in my address, was vacant. I called Fedex I and said I lived here and they said they'd fix it, but 2 or 3 more times I had to call because they failed to deliver. It took an extra week and the bush's pot was all dried out.

On 8 Jul 2024 05:03:21 GMT, rbowman posted for all of us to digest...

Ha Good one!