Watch Enough Videos About Hiking Accidents, and Every Hiker Starts to Look Stupid
Recently, I have been watching a lot of YouTube videos that break down hiking accidents and mountain rescues.
They are surprisingly compelling. Not that the accidents themselves are entertaining, but learning how each situation developed always makes me think.
Why didn’t they bring a map?
Why didn’t they turn back as soon as they knew they could not return before sunset?
Don’t head into the mountains with gear like that.
I cannot help talking back to the screen.
But after watching one video after another, I begin to fall under a strange illusion.
Why are people who climb mountains so reckless?
Wait. Something is wrong with that conclusion.
People Who Return Safely Never Become Videos
When you think about it, the reason is obvious.
People who make a proper plan, check the weather, carry enough equipment, and return on schedule do not appear in videos about hiking accidents.
The hike began at 8:00 a.m. They reached the summit as planned, returned safely at 3:00 p.m., stopped at a hot spring, and went home.
I would be more surprised if someone made an accident video about that.
The people featured on YouTube are the ones something happened to. They lost the trail, misjudged the weather, pushed ahead too far, and ended up stranded.
In other words, the world I am watching consists entirely of people selected because they failed.
It is a form of selection bias that works in the opposite direction from the familiar idea of survivorship bias: only the failures are visible.
The vast majority who return safely never appear on the screen.
Even Getting Stranded Is Not Interesting Without Something to Criticize
There is another layer of bias even among videos about hiking accidents.
The videos I watch rarely feature cases in which the weather simply changed without warning or someone suddenly slipped and fell.
The reason is probably simple.
Viewers have nothing to criticize.
Someone prepared thoroughly but was caught by an unpredictable change in weather. Someone was walking carefully but slipped and fell.
All anyone can say is, “That was unfortunate,” and the story is over.
But the story changes when someone enters the mountains without a map, gets lost, refuses to turn back, and is still outside after dark.
Turn back right there!
Why are you still going forward?
Viewers can have a wonderful time shouting at the screen.
The fact that someone became stranded is not enough. The more human errors the story contains, and the more opportunities viewers have to say, “I would have done this instead,” the more entertaining the video becomes.
Mountain accident videos are records of real emergencies, but they are also entertainment built around reviewing human failure.
As a result, the people selected for the screen are often those whose decisions give viewers the most to criticize.
No wonder hikers begin to look increasingly foolish.
There Are Mysterious Wins, but No Mysterious Losses
This reminds me of a saying often used by Katsuya Nomura, a famous manager in Japanese professional baseball.
A victory may come for mysterious reasons, but a defeat never does.
The saying is originally attributed to Matsuura Seizan, a feudal lord from Japan’s Edo period.
Sometimes luck helps a team win. But when a team loses, there is always a reason.
The same idea applies to hiking accidents.
Someone may be poorly prepared yet return safely because the weather was kind. Someone who gets lost may happen to meet another hiker who helps.
But when we study actual accidents, we often find that several poor decisions accumulated.
They started too late. They ignored the weather forecast. They were exhausted but refused to turn back.
Each mistake may be small, but together they can become fatal.
Mountain accident videos, however, explain these reasons for defeat in particular detail.
The clearer the reasons are, the easier it is for viewers to understand the outcome and learn what not to do.
More importantly, clear mistakes are easy to criticize.
To borrow Nomura’s saying, perhaps a “mysterious defeat” does not attract many views on YouTube.
The Most Dangerous Person May Be Me, Laughing at the Screen
When I watch these videos, I cannot help thinking, I would never make a decision like that.
But I already know the ending.
I know they will lose the trail, get caught after dark, and eventually have to call for rescue.
It is like taking an exam while looking at the answer sheet.
Then I sit there wondering how anyone could get such an easy question wrong.
That is remarkably arrogant.
The people in these accidents did not begin their hikes intending to get stranded.
This should be fine.
They acted on that thought, and the situation became irreversible.
That phrase—This should be fine—appears not only in the mountains, but also in everyday life and at work.
That is why videos about hiking accidents are worth learning from.
But there is one thing I must not forget.
I am not smarter than the people in those videos. I simply know the ending before they do.
And if I ever climbed a mountain and got stranded myself, the comments would surely say exactly the same thing.
Why didn’t he turn back there? What an idiot.