WM - Safety - Nome

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Re: WM - Safety - Nome

Postby elsietee » Sat Mar 24, 2018 2:16 pm

Couldn't figure out where to put this, but here's as good a place as any.

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Someone posted a link to the Washington Post article about the Lanier/Janssen incident outside Safety:
http://wapo.st/2psv2UE?tid=ss_tw-bottom ... 6d0d61556c

I read the article and thought "unimpressed by accuracy of media".

And then someone posted a link to Craid Meldred's comments on the WP story (which pretty much mirrored my thoughts):
https://craigmedred.news/2018/03/20/idit-a-fable/

And then Craig took the time, as more information became available, to figure out exactly who was involved and who was where, when:

https://craigmedred.news/2018/03/23/fog-of-iditarod/

He includes a screen shot that Anna Bonderenko (Jim Lanier's wife) posted that morning, showing their trackers:

Lanier-Janssen-Stuck.jpg


I was able to zoom in to Monica and Brett Bruggeman's trackers to the same spot (Lanier and Janssen's tracks were removed once they scratched):

Zappa-Bruggeman-Safety.JPG


And lastly, here's a video posted by Anna B, from Jay Cable, one of the Iditabikers who came upon Jim and Scott:

https://www.facebook.com/jay.cable/vide ... 389262512/

It sort of puts into perspective the conditions everyone was dealing with. Sunrise was at 9:15 the morning of this incident, so way after everything had happened.

Jay Cable, via FB:
"One of the more "interesting" (perhaps scary would be a better word) experiences in my ride to Nome this year was two encounters with Iditarod mushers in the "blowhole", a short section of trail before Safety that can have very strong winds. Here is a short clip of Philip Hofstetter helping a musher (I didn't take the time to figure out which one) find his way in the blowhole. This is the un-edited video from the camera, so don't expect anything awesome, but hopefully gives folks a feeling for what it was like. The musher is in gray, and his dogs were fine, though a bit non-plussed by the wind. It was around 4f, and maybe mid 40mph.
(This was not one of the mushers who got stuck.)"

The musher shown in the video is Lev Shvarts. Timing-wise, Lev was behind the mushers involved in the Lanier/Janssen incident, so the bikers (travelling the same direction down the trail) would have come across him first. Rerunning the tracker for all the mushers around the incident, at one point Lev backtracks a short distance - as though to look for trail markers, so possibly that's what's going on in this video.

Jay Cable posted a series of excellent photos - showing the trail in detail, with little comments, which are worth looking at (esp. when you couple what he's showing with comments from mushers about the trail conditions in various places):

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid ... =3&theater
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Re: WM - Safety - Nome

Postby fladogfan » Sat Mar 24, 2018 2:30 pm

Thanks for all your research elsie, this looks like it took a lot of time. Now going back to read all your links.
Just want to say, I think it's a bad/poor idea to take down the tracks of scratched teams. Their tracks are all part of the story of the race.
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Re: WM - Safety - Nome

Postby elsietee » Sat Mar 24, 2018 2:34 pm

It was pretty interesting - one part leading to the next.

I just found another cache from Jay Cable where he biked from Chena Hot Springs to Eagle during the Yukon Quest - more great pics of the trail, trail conditions, and mushers (and their apparent yard sales - wondering who owned the snow shoes... guessing another musher grabbed them on the next pass :) ):

https://www.facebook.com/jay.cable/medi ... 020&type=3
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Re: WM - Safety - Nome

Postby fladogfan » Sat Mar 24, 2018 3:10 pm

I'll be back. supper is ready ;) DH in charge tonight, so TV dinners it is :D
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Re: WM - Safety - Nome

Postby elsietee » Sat Mar 24, 2018 6:36 pm

Tim Muto is writing his story:

https://www.freeborndogmushing.com/sing ... ake---Rohn

"There was one memorable, 120 degree ice turn where you are to stay up on a ice ledge, big hole on your left on the inside of the turn. I was off the break and leaning out to avoid being swallowed. When the trail straightened, my sled tipped over to the right, and I was sliding straight for another hole in the ice. Somehow, with my sled on its side and me being dragged behind it, I was able to summon super human strength and right the sled to narrowly avoid that hole. I still have no idea how I pulled that one off…"

I think he's describing the place where, in the Run Dogs Run video, that musher (Jessie, possibly?) headbutts their handlebar when they fall in the hole.
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Re: WM - Safety - Nome

Postby fladogfan » Sat Mar 24, 2018 6:43 pm

Those two sets of photos showing the trails, of the Iditarod and Quest, really gave me a better perspective of what the trail looks like.
Hard to think about people trying to ride bikes, even fat tire ones, in that snow. I wonder how many miles were on their feet pushing their bikes?
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Re: WM - Safety - Nome

Postby Moose » Tue Mar 27, 2018 5:19 am

I wondered the same thing, Fdf--pushing vs. riding. How light the bikers seem to travel has amazed me. Dry bags over wheels and a few other smaller bags affixed here and there. But I was surprised, and happy, to learn that they have drop bags flown out along the trail as well. Still, hardy, hardy individuals.

Kudos to Medred (this time) for gathering and tying together all the threads of the Lanier/Jennsen story. A big high-five to everyone involved.

And, not for the last time, high-fives and a hat-tip to ElsieT, her excellent ears and flying fingers for relaying all the stories of the trail.
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