MERLIN, Ore. - A San Francisco man who got stranded in the snowy wilderness with his family nearly two weeks ago was found dead Wednesday in a mountain creek, authorities said.
James Kim’s body was discovered in Oregon’s snowy Klamath Mountains two days after his wife and two daughters were rescued from their car, stuck on a remote road. Kim had set out on foot over the weekend to find help for his family.
Ground crews and helicopters had been searching the area for Kim for days.
A tearful Undersheriff Brian Anderson announced the discovery of the body, his voice breaking at one point. He gave no details on the cause of death or how far from the family’s car Kim was found.
Earlier in the day, searchers said they had uncovered clues that suggested Kim had shed clothing and arranged it to give searchers clues to his whereabouts. They had also made plans to drop rescue packages for Kim with clothing, emergency gear and provisions.
Kim, 35, was a senior editor for the technology media company CNET Networks Inc. He and his family had been missing since Nov. 25. They were heading home to San Francisco after a family vacation in the Pacific Northwest.
Pants foundA pair of pants Kim had been wearing was found in the wilderness on Tuesday, raising fears that he had become delirious from the cold.
Kim’s wife, Kati, told officers that the couple made a wrong turn and became stuck in the snow. They used their car heater until they ran out of gas, then burned tires to stay warm and attract attention. With only a few jars of baby food and limited supplies, Kati Kim nursed her children.
Roads in the area are often not plowed in the winter and can become impassable.
About 100 rescue workers and four helicopters searched for Kim, following his footprints down the creek, which leads to the Rogue River.
Searchers told NBC News that at one point they were able to make direct contact with Kim on the ground and that they had explored ways to lower a medic to the site. It was not immediately clear whether that attempt was aborted or was undertaken too late to save Kim.
Missing after ThanksgivingThe Kims had been missing since Nov. 25, when they left Portland and headed home after a holiday trip to the Pacific Northwest.
Kati Kim told officers they were traveling south from Portland on Interstate 5 and missed the turnoff to a state highway, Oregon 42, that leads through the Coast Range to Gold Beach, where they planned to stay at a resort.
Officers said the couple used a map to choose the road they were on. “They got the map out — a regular highway map — that showed the route,” Anderson said.
Which map was used?However, it wasn’t clear whose map the couple used. The 2005-2007 state highway map distributed by the Oregon Department of Transportation has a warning in red print, inside a red box: “This route closed in winter.” A Rand McNally map did not have a similar warning.
On Monday, searchers in a private helicopter hired by the family spotted Kati Kim, 30, and the two girls. They were released from a hospital in Grants Pass on Tuesday.
Stuck, the family used their car heater until it ran out of gas, then burned tires to stay warm and attract attention. With only a few jars of baby food and limited supplies, Kati Kim nursed her children.
Employer tributeKim's employer, CNET, headquartered in San Francisco, remade the front page of its Web site in his memory Wednesday. The Web site documented Kim's professional passions.
Kim, a senior editor specializing in MP3 and digital audio, considered digital audio and writing his "passions." Kim wrote more than 400 product reviews covering a broad range of technology, the CNet Web site said.
James Kim’s body was discovered in Oregon’s snowy Klamath Mountains two days after his wife and two daughters were rescued from their car, stuck on a remote road. Kim had set out on foot over the weekend to find help for his family.
Ground crews and helicopters had been searching the area for Kim for days.
A tearful Undersheriff Brian Anderson announced the discovery of the body, his voice breaking at one point. He gave no details on the cause of death or how far from the family’s car Kim was found.
Earlier in the day, searchers said they had uncovered clues that suggested Kim had shed clothing and arranged it to give searchers clues to his whereabouts. They had also made plans to drop rescue packages for Kim with clothing, emergency gear and provisions.
Kim, 35, was a senior editor for the technology media company CNET Networks Inc. He and his family had been missing since Nov. 25. They were heading home to San Francisco after a family vacation in the Pacific Northwest.
Pants foundA pair of pants Kim had been wearing was found in the wilderness on Tuesday, raising fears that he had become delirious from the cold.
Kim’s wife, Kati, told officers that the couple made a wrong turn and became stuck in the snow. They used their car heater until they ran out of gas, then burned tires to stay warm and attract attention. With only a few jars of baby food and limited supplies, Kati Kim nursed her children.
Roads in the area are often not plowed in the winter and can become impassable.
About 100 rescue workers and four helicopters searched for Kim, following his footprints down the creek, which leads to the Rogue River.
Searchers told NBC News that at one point they were able to make direct contact with Kim on the ground and that they had explored ways to lower a medic to the site. It was not immediately clear whether that attempt was aborted or was undertaken too late to save Kim.
Missing after ThanksgivingThe Kims had been missing since Nov. 25, when they left Portland and headed home after a holiday trip to the Pacific Northwest.
Kati Kim told officers they were traveling south from Portland on Interstate 5 and missed the turnoff to a state highway, Oregon 42, that leads through the Coast Range to Gold Beach, where they planned to stay at a resort.
Officers said the couple used a map to choose the road they were on. “They got the map out — a regular highway map — that showed the route,” Anderson said.
Which map was used?However, it wasn’t clear whose map the couple used. The 2005-2007 state highway map distributed by the Oregon Department of Transportation has a warning in red print, inside a red box: “This route closed in winter.” A Rand McNally map did not have a similar warning.
On Monday, searchers in a private helicopter hired by the family spotted Kati Kim, 30, and the two girls. They were released from a hospital in Grants Pass on Tuesday.
Stuck, the family used their car heater until it ran out of gas, then burned tires to stay warm and attract attention. With only a few jars of baby food and limited supplies, Kati Kim nursed her children.
Employer tributeKim's employer, CNET, headquartered in San Francisco, remade the front page of its Web site in his memory Wednesday. The Web site documented Kim's professional passions.
Kim, a senior editor specializing in MP3 and digital audio, considered digital audio and writing his "passions." Kim wrote more than 400 product reviews covering a broad range of technology, the CNet Web site said.
3 comments:
It happens.
But this one feels sadder than others, that is news of other strangers dying rather tragically, semi-heroically. It's possible that my frequent visits to the CNET website and watching the videoblog reviews by Mr Kim, have made me feel a small part of this loss and the desperate path which lead to it. I know I shall never see his youthful, excited face run over the pros and cons of the latest technical gadget. I know that he and his family got lost in the snow, in a canyon, far from home, on their return to San Francisco after the Thanksgiving holiday - their last holiday together (will the family ever celebrate it again, I wonder).
He was driving, presumably, so did his wife misnavigate? Or was it all his own fault? Knowing that time and the elements were against them, did he face a neverending barrage of fears, worse-case scenarios, the lives of his wife and child and their slow cold deaths driving him on, even unto death in despair. For certainly, as his final breaths left his body, he must have thought he had failed his family, that there was every possibility that they had already died, perhaps even attempting to strike out on their own in the snow once he did not return as planned. How much more miserable had he made their deaths, he may have wondered.
Earlier, before his life began deteriorating by the minute, had he pleaded with some god, his god, any god, even if he had never believed in god before, asking that his wife and child be saved in exchange for his own life? Had an agreement been made. Is his family alive to-day only because of that bargain?
The report says that helicopters made contact with him and planned to drop clothing and food to him. What went amiss? Was he alive, even barely, when the copter hovered overhead. If so, was this enough of an assurance that his family must have been rescued first? Did he hang on grimly to life until someone in the copter megaphoned down below to him: Hey, we got your wife and kid! They're OK! They're waiting for you to come home to them. Hang on!
Would this news be enough for him to finally stop fighting off the death which should have by all rights claimed his life hours earlier? Did he die with one last joyous smile feebly playing on his face?
Thirty-five years old. Poor sod. It was a good death, though.
Bravo, James Kim. Rest in peace.
Officials: Father died of hypothermia
James Kim’s body found in canyon; he had left stranded family to seek help
MERLIN, Ore. - Lost in the snowy wilderness and seeking help for his stranded family, James Kim probably traveled more than 10 miles on foot before he died, believing he could find a nearby town, authorities said Thursday.
An autopsy showed that he died of hypothermia. His body was found in a creek’s shallow water, about a mile away from his family’s car.
Dr. James Olson, a deputy state medical examiner, was unable to determine the exact time of death, said Lt. Gregg Hastings of the Oregon State Police.
But at a news conference, authorities tried to chronicle Kim's last days in the snowy wilderness.
Kim, 35, was a senior editor for the technology media company CNET Networks Inc. He and his family had been missing since Nov. 25. They were heading home to San Francisco after a family vacation in the Pacific Northwest when he, his wife and two young daughters became stranded on a remote mountain road.
Hastings said the family got stuck after they missed an interchange, and ended up going through Grant’s Pass, an area the Oregon Department of Transportation does not recommend driving through during wintertime.
“They got lost, the weather started to turn bad. They stopped at a forked intersection and called it a night,” Hastings said.
Used car for heat
In the first four days that they were stranded, Hastings said, the Kims “occasionally started up the car for heat” until they ran out of gas. They then used a spare tire to start a fire to try to attract attention and stay warm, he said.
Last Saturday, Kim went for help at 7:46 in the morning, Hastings said.
“He built a fire for Kati (his wife) and the kids before he left on foot,” he said. Kim told his wife he would be back by 1 p.m. the following day.
“James Kim did nothing wrong. He was trying to save his family,” said Hastings. “He thought that if he could get to the river, he could make it to the town.”
Kim thought the nearby town of Galice was only 4 miles away, although it was really 15 miles from where he was, Hastings said.
Kati Kim, 30, and her daughters, Penelope, 4, and Sabine, 7 months, were rescued Monday after waving an umbrella for helicopters to see, according to Hastings. She told officers that with only a few jars of baby food and limited supplies, she nursed both children.
The key to finding the family’s car, police said, was a “ping” from one of the family’s cell phones that helped narrow down their location.
After scouring the mountains of southern Oregon for days, a search helicopter hired by his family spotted Kim’s body midday Wednesday. He was found fully clothed on his back in Big Windy Creek near the Rogue River, authorities said.
James Kim’s body was found at the foot of the Big Windy Creek drainage, a half-mile from the Rogue River, where ground crews and helicopters had been searching for days.
Investigators believe he traveled about eight miles in total, and said there was no way he could have reached the car directly from where he was found.
Searchers said they believed Kim had shed clothing and arranged it to give searchers clues to his whereabouts. They had planned to drop rescue packages with clothing, emergency gear and provisions.
A tearful Josephine County Undersheriff Brian Anderson announced the discovery of Kim's body on Wednesday, his voice breaking at one point.
“He was very motivated,” Anderson said. “We were having trouble in there. He traveled a long distance.”
Lock was cut on gate barring Oregon road
San Francisco man died close to feed, shelter in wilderness, officials say
CENTRAL POINT, Ore. - A San Francisco man who got stranded with his family in the snowy wilderness had taken a wrong turn in the car down a logging road that is normally blocked by a gate, but vandals had cut the lock, authorities said Friday.
James Kim, 35, was found dead of exposure in a mountain creek Wednesday, two days after his wife and the couple's two daughters were rescued from the car.
The gate had been locked for the winter Nov. 1, after the end of deer hunting season, so that "people don't mistakenly go down that road," said Patty Burel, spokeswoman for the federal Bureau of Land Management.
Searchers looking for the family found the gate open, Burel said. An investigation is under way to find out who cut the lock.
The one-lane strip of pavement known as Bear Camp Road is often used in summer by Rogue River rafters and in winter by hunters, cross-country skiers and families cutting Christmas trees.
The Kims were returning to their San Francisco home after a Thanksgiving trip to Seattle when they ventured onto the road and into a confusing warren of logging routes.
They got stuck in the snow 15 miles past the gate and stayed with the car for a week, consuming only baby food, jelly and bottled water, and burning tires and wood to keep warm and to alert rescuers.
Kati Kim and her daughters, 4-year-old Penelope and 7-month-old Sabine, were spotted Monday from a search helicopter and were rescued in good condition after nine days in the cold.
Two days earlier, James Kim, an online editor for CNet, had struck out on foot to find help. He was found dead after he had walked 10 miles.
He, 35, had no way of knowing about the Black Bar Lodge, where he could have found shelter, warmth and enough food for months, authorities said.
“I wish Mr. Kim would have found the place,” owner John James said. “It would have been a beautiful ending to a sad story.”
A medical examiner said Thursday he could not determine exactly when James Kim died.
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Kims missed turnoff, passed warning signs
The Kims had driven from San Francisco to Seattle for Thanksgiving and were on their way home. They planned to spend the night of Nov. 25 at a luxury lodge outside Gold Beach on the coast.
Driving south on Interstate 5, the Kims had missed the turnoff to the coast and instead drove through the Siskiyou National Forest.
They passed signs warning that Bear Camp Road may be blocked by snow, but kept going. At times, James had to stick his head out the window to see through the falling snow, said state police Lt. Gregg Hastings.
They descended into a confusing warren of logging roads.
By the time they turned around, they were 15 miles off Bear Camp Road and stopped where they hoped to be spotted from the air, fearing they were running out of gas, searchers said.
Kati Kim told investigators they stopped at 2 a.m. Nov. 26, but could get no cell phone service. They stayed in the car as it snowed and rained for three days.
They had only baby food, jelly and bottled water, Hastings said. When the bottled water ran out, they melted snow. When the food ran out, Kati Kim nursed the children.
'Trying to save his family'
On the eighth day, James Kim decided to look for help. His wife told investigators he thought he was just four miles down the Rogue River from the community of Galice. It was closer to 15. But he felt he could follow the river to find help.
“James Kim did nothing wrong,” Hastings said. “He was trying to save his family.”
Kim had walked five miles up a road, then five more miles down rugged Big Windy Creek. Despite his long hike, he was only a mile from the car, which was near the road to the lodge.
On Thursday, the Kim house — with its cheery, red garage door and window sills, perched up a small hill — stood dark and empty in San Francisco’s Noe Valley neighborhood.
A few blocks away, a sign outside Church Street Apothecary, one of the Kims’ two boutiques, read: “We will be closed for a few days. Please respect our privacy.”
Below the sign, scores of flowers, cards and candles conveyed warm wishes from neighbors.
“Your dad is a hero. Your dad is a great, kind man. He will always love you very much,” said a handmade card written in a child’s scrawl, signed by “Malia.”
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