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Pussies. If you get lost, sleep in your wingsuits and drink mudwater like men!

Las Vegas, NV - KTNV - Some Las Vegas thrill seekers end up stranded for nearly two days in the Arizona desert. The four men went base jumping along the Little Colorado River, north of Flagstaff. But once they reached the bottom of the more than 800 foot canyon, they couldn't get back out.

All of them are professional skydivers with Sin City Skydiving in Jean. But out of all the adrenaline rushes they've had, nothing has scared them as much as 48 hours trapped with little water.

"The safest thing we did that day was base jumping, the safest thing," Brince Wates says.

That day was Monday. It started out with the usual winged suits and parachutes. The jump into the ravine went great. It was the climb out that got complicated.

"It was supposed to be a three to four hour hike and then it turned into 48 hours," Johnny Strange says.

The jumpers, Johnny Strange, Brince Wates, Matthew Rosado and Jace Ramsey couldn't find the path back up the mountain face. And they had only packed enough water for a few hours.

"I thought we were dead, I thought we were going to die there, I really did," Brince says.

"Who knew in two days you could go from having the best time ever to thinking just leave me for dead because I can't go any further," Jace Ramsey says.

But they continued on for hours, exhausted.

"To the point where you were urinating on yourself waiting for a breeze to keep you cool, very very dire straits," Matthew Rosado says.

"We had to drink our own pee and eat cactus, but that's just what we had to do to survive," Strange says.

When desperation kicked in, Brince broke away from the group to search for a way out. He found it, and rescue crews.

"When he comes back down and yells, hey guys I found a way out of here, that was a huge relief," Rosado says.

The men told their loved ones where they're were going, so when they didn't call at an agreed upon time, they knew to call for help.

That base jump was not legal. The men could be facing a huge fine as well as forced to pay back money used for search and rescue. If you want to learn more about them, their skydiving or base jumping just click on the links below.

Night falls in a deathly dry desert


Night falls, the overwhelming desire for liquid conquers all my thoughts as I piss into my empty water bottle. The water at the bottom is only a few inches deep, muddy, dirty, and would result in jardia if we drank it which could result in death if not treated under these circumstances. It teases us as we sit in it to try and cool ourselves down after the desperate day we had. I hold the bottle lift it to my nose. The dehydrated piss stings my nostrils, but surviving is more important at this point so I take my first sip. How the fuck did we end up in this mess? I think.
The previous morning started out as planned. 5 am, Brince Wages, Matt Rosado, Jace Ramsey, and I get into the car packed with base jumping rigs as we drive deep into the Desert controlled by the Navajo nation. After we park the car we search for our jumping point. 1500ft cliffs line the little Colorado gorge, the excitement in the air pumps us up for what we expect to be a 3hr ordeal. We reach the top of an 1800ft cliff, breath taking just by the look of it, but the lingering knowledge that we are here to jump off raises the hair on my neck. This is the one. We pack our base rigs up, and decide what to bring. The hike out was only supposed to take 2-3 hours at a decent pace, so I only decided to bring 2 bottles of water which I know from experience can last me up to 6 hrs. A stupid mistake I would later dearly regret, the excitement from the jump consumed my thoughts rather then being prepared. Brince had 5 gatorades, matt 2 liters, Jace 6 bottles. Jace stands over the cliff, wingsuit spread like an eagle as he glances back with a grin. In a second he is gone, hurling through the air, when the wingsuit inflates he soars over the canyon truly flying until he pulls his parachute and safely lands. I stand next, not wanting to hesitate I take my first step to the ledge and jump. Rushing towards the ground the visual I receive is insane before I pull my chute. Land and wait as matt and brince jump off, soaring over the canyon. When everyone lands we all give each other high fives and the grins can not be removed from us at this point. We pack up our base rigs and head out. Over the next 48hrs base jumping would be the safest part of our journey. As we hike along the canyon floor, we look up for the possible route. Eventually we pick something to try and climb, everyone drinking their water, just another day in the canyon. We start the journey up, there is no trail so we thought maybe the trail markers just got washed away. After about 2 hours of hiking we reach a point where we couldn’t go any further. Scanning the cliffs we decide on what to do. Since we couldn’t go any further the only option was to turn back down all the way to the bottom and search for another route out. The intense heat and hiking ment more drinking so everyone started running low on water, I still had a little less then a bottle left. We need to cool down. When we reach the bottom we strip down and sit in some of the still muddy water, cooling our core tempatures, still unaware of the situation still to come. We hike about 2 hours along the floor of the canyon, scanning the cliffs for a way out, but nothing. We decide to pick another route because time was running out and spending the night was not an option. Climbing the steep rocks with our heavy packs in the harsh desert canyon proved to drain the liquids out extremely quick. With no intention of turning around we started climbing the sheer cliffs. This wasn’t exactly a normal group of people. matt was a mechanic and an extremely talented skydiver/base jumper with thousands of jumps, Brince grew up doing a multitude of sports including rock climbing and had over 10,000 jumps, and jace worked in a wilderness camp for troubled kids as a counselor and also had over 10,000 jumps! After climbing the 7 summits I didn’t really expect much from a 3hr walk in the desert. A stupid mistake I have learned before that I will now never forget. You should for no reason ever underestimate any journey, not scared, just prepared. But as the excitement of the jump consumed our thoughts we were not expecting anything over 4 hours most. So 48 hours took a toll on us. The harsh out cropping rock turns out to be more then just a scramble. Now rock climbing up the cliffs, it started to get to the points where we couldn’t climb with our packs at this rate to make it out before dark. The decision was made to try and return to safer grounds as quick as possible before night came. But this was an ordeal for all of us. We were all almost out of water. The little half bottle we had left was agreed to be for under no circumstances unless in dier need could you have a cap full of in order to be able to survive . we were going to try and spend the fucking night in the grand canyon. We reached were we decided to sleep, in desperate need for liquid. It was at this moment I realized I was the most dehydrated I had ever been. I was not going to make another climbing mistake at this point, we all had to stay calm. It got to the point were it felt life or death to me so I knew what had to be done in these situations. We knew it was all just dehydration and had to stay calm and hydrated the whole time. I previously told my parents I would not be able to be reached that day to not raise concern (yet another stupid, stupid move) but they were fine knowing I was with people who know what they are doing and training me right. We had another guy supposed to meet us there the next day, and jace, brince, and matt had people expecting there calls so it was immediantly an issue when the time we were supposed to call never happened. But due to the fact they didn’t want to call the sheriff on us and since stuff like this was not uncommon for the group it was assumed by most that we were fine. I held my empty water bottle in my hand, the last bit of piss I could summon up came out and into the water bottle in a dark yellow color. I didn’t want to alarm the group so I stayed as calm as possible with the piss in my hand. I walk to the group, we had all stripped down at this point and sat in the shallow mud trying to cool ourselves down. I informed them I was going to drink my own pee, this was the next level though. I burried the bottle half way into the sand to cool it. Took a look around in my head. Even though I was beyond dehydration in no way did I think we were not ok. I knew how far I could push myself and everyone around me was remaining calm and strong. We were going to do whatever needed to be done in order to survive no exceptions. I look at jace, could I get a cap full of water to chase this piss down? We agreed no water unless dier circumstances, if we did that we should have enough for about 4 cap fulls each tomorrow when we find the way out. Not wanting to sound as desperate as I was I said ok no problem and take my first gulp of the piss with no chaser. I would like to say it was disgusting but at this point the liquid wetting the inside of my mouth was to nice of a sensation to care about something such as taste. Everyone else was bad with dehydration as well, and soon enough before the night ended we had all pissed in water bottles and tried it. As the night continued we wrapped ourselves in the parachutes, only woken by the massive elk that trampled through our camp (apparently since they can not be reached by hunters down there they get huge) and tried to get a few hours of rest before we set off at first light. Using the small edge of the hook knife (a concealed razor like tool used for cutting your parachute lines in case you have a line over) I cut the bottom off of a water bottle. I was not getting enough piss anyways so I was going to need more liquid in order for the hike out tomorrow. Already the group as been picking the tops of cactus and eating the juice out of them but it was a slow process and resulted in millions of cactus needles in our tounges face hands etc. I decided I would fill my water bottle upside down with them, crush up the cactus in there then suck it out the water bottle. After I finished it was just the waiting game until light. Dreams of liquid consumed my sleep. When the first light appeared we all got up to go collect berries. As a team we collected about 30 or so by just grabbing them with our hands and stock piling them. The pain from the needles was nothing compared to the thirst so it wasn’t a factor at this point. We all rehydrated as much as we could with these which actually significantly helped and we could save our pee for later if it got worse. At this point I was thinking with our packs on the best thing we could do would be to walk downstream, stay hydrated by the berries and find a way out. We knew about 20 miles down the river should be another hike out anyways. The only problem with that is the car above us had 5 bottles of water in it and if we went out another way we would be extremely far from it. Brince was determined to make it out on the other hand. He seemed to be more hydrated then us still and content on finding the way out of here. We all agreed to find a route up one of these washes. The one thing I said to the group that was most important to me was to stick together. I knew from climbing that if we all got separated it could get really bad, we all needed to stick together. We found 2 rock falls that we thought could be used to get out. Brince went to check one out, as matt went to look at the other. Jace and I remained in between discussing what to do. We heard brince make a yell so we called matt to come down so we could go over to brince and stick together. By the time matt got down and we walked over to the route brince was at, he was out of sight. We knew he must have found a way so we all started climbing. When we reached the rock climbing point, there was multiple ways brince could’ve went, and to our surprise his pack was there. He needed to come back for his pack so we made a plan. Jace and matt were going to wait there and I was going to try and find brince. I leave my pack and slowly edge around the sheer cliffs searching for his footprints among the rocks. Nothing. I return back down to matt and jace. We start to think brince was hurt and that was why he had not returned for his pack if he found a way out. The decision was made to return back to the canyon floor, jace would take care of brinces extra pack, but at this point the lack of hydration mixed with the brutal canyon heat struck matt hard. He was lying on the ground barely moving at this point. I roll down his pack as we head to the ground. After jace and I reach the ground I come to him in a serious voice. I knew how to survive and wasn’t worried at this point even though things looked at its worse. I told him this is the plan, brince could be hurt up there, matt is in desperate need of some liquid, so its up to us to save this. You and I are going to get cool and hydrated, go collect as much cactus as we can, and go on a rescue mission to brince and matt after we set up the parachutes so a helicopter can see them. He was calm and agreed, as we started to walk on our search for cactus, I devastating feeling creeps up my body. I freeze. I know that most things are mental and even though I was at my dehydration breaking point last night I just needed to keep it together. But this feeling was different. “Uh oh,” the words come out my mouth as jace looks at me, “hold on jace one second” I mutter as I clench my gut and fall to my knees I face the ground and start puking. All the liquid I had left splatters on the dirt, I think for a second should I try and get the liquid out of it but its too late the throw up has dried and I start to feel a severe pain. I lay right next to my puke with jace by my side and he gives me a cap full of water. I don’t have anymore piss to drink and no more berries. I am crumpled up in a ball next to my throw up. Jace lays down as well and informs me he starts to feel sick This is the moment when I thought we were going to die. Now desperately sick I couldn’t move, let alone go and save brince and matt. Shit, I thought. This is how it ends. Clutching the sand and staring into my own throw up I try and conserve the little energy I have left. It is then I hear it, brinces yell,”I made it to the top” I fucking made it to the top and I got water!” Brince decided to leave his pack and made a daring rock climb up through the cracks of a cliff. With no water he single handedly mustered up the will and climbed up. When he felt as though he could go no longer, foam coming from his mouth and death in his thoughts he sat down somewhere above. Glancing to his left he saw a rope. Two rock climbing ropes up the last 300ft of the cliff. Pulling himself out of the canyon he reached the top and car. Drank a bottle of water and rested. He knew we needed water to get out, and after hydrating he felt strong enough to come back with water to get his pack and we could all climb out. It is this that saved our lives. When I heard his yell I could barely believe it. Jace starts to move back up slowly carrying his and brinces pack, I start moving up with mine and matts. I try and keep it together as I climb up to them even though my current state has crippled me. When we reach him we all get a bottle each and try and gather the strength but we were all fucked up at this point. Dawning our back packs we start to follow the route brince found. As we rock climb the sheer cliffs, jace hits the wall. brince tried to call jace’s girlfriend but the signal was no good up there and when jace thinks about the situation tears fall from his eye. These are some of the toughest people in the world. They have thousands of jumps and we have all been through extreme ordeals, life or death is an every day thing for us yet this was fucking different. This was the closest any of us had been to death (which is saying a lot), and the thought of loved ones overwhelmed the sanity that was being kept. This is getting bad I thought. But we had to keep moving. Brince continues leading us up the rugged cliffs but we decide none of us can make It with our packs. The decision was made that we either stash our packs and make it out alive, or we will never make it out of here. After stashing our packs in the cliff we continue the treacherous climb up. It is the hottest part of the day at this point and the grueling heat inside the desert canyon made us boil on the hot rock. Our mouths felt as dry as the sandy desert itself and the combined heat sent us into any shade we could find. We reach a cave and all pile in it. At this point I am just in my boxers and shoes, I left my pants back at the stash spot. We all lay together in the cave, breaking points far passed and gather the strength. We head up to the next shade spot, and decide we can not go any further in this heat, so we try and get some sleep hidden in this crack that is providing shade. Scorpions, rattle snakes, etc where the least of our problems. I was trying to remain calm still but I was fucked the night before, so at this point I am at a new level. I was hallucinating in the canyon and tripping out in my head but I remained calm. Everyone was in a shit situation at this point. We continued our slow climb out. Up the vertical cliffs, climbed the first rope section. In our life or death state words can not describe what we felt as we continued. We look up to see people at the top looking down at us. “Water!” we yell. “Leave water!” the wind blows out our voices though. The roar of a helicopter engine comes zooming over head. At this point we were only about 100 vertical feat from the top. The helicopter couldn’t get close enough to pick us up because there was no where to land and the blades would hit the cliff if they got any closer. Water is dropped down. The first bottle the helicopter tried to throw however gets washed away by the power of the helicopter blades. It was like seeing heaven being taken away in front of our eyes. We catch the second bottle and the third. Once the liquid is in us we instantly feel strong again and climb out. It is night at this point and waiting at the top are some not so happy Navajo nation police and the search and rescue team. We were going to try and tell them we were not base jumping but at this point we were so happy to be alive and the cops already knew we were jumping anyways because of people calling since we were missing. The paramedics came to us as we sat on the back of the cop car pouring water in our mouth just happy to be alive. Are you ok? Yeah were all fine we just needed water and were happy to be alive. At this point we didn’t care what they did, they could throw us in jail and as long as they gave us water we would be fine. The medics were kind of stunned we were now smiling and laughing and informs us most people that go missing down there never come up. They even asked us if we found a german guys body that was down there. The Navajo cops get all of our info and let us go since we were so messed up anyways tonight and we agreed to meet at the police station in the morning. As we drove off there was a humbling silence in the car. We have all had thousands of near death experiences before but this by far was the closest we had come to death.
The next morning we head to the police station, have a long talk with the Navajo police officer, who turned out to be pretty cool. He told us about this other group that went missing, resulting in one of them dying. We all knew how close we came. Gratefull to be alive, we got in the car, and headed back. “well, that deserves a beer” was the common thought amongst the group. It was only an hour or two before some one texted us a news article about what just happened. “four Nevada men helicoptered out of the little Colorado gorge after base jumping.” What a surprise I thought. The story is already wrong. We were never heli-lifted out, at that point we were already almost at the top when the helicopter even arrived, even though we were forever grateful they could drop water down. It was really Brince Wages who saved our lives. “guess we better clear this story up. My parents are going to be pissed if I make the 6 o clock news one more time” It’s impossible to describe what we went through to anyone, but I can try and tell you best I can. I apologize for all the swearing but this is just how it happened. I am not a Disney channel kid, this is not a PG rated blog, and I refuse to change the way I write. I always hear of role models acting perfect, or making it seem like they did everything right in order to achieve there goals. Well personally I think those people are full of shit. Everyone makes mistakes that is not important, it is weather you learn from them that matters. A lot of mistakes were made on this trip, we learned our lesson though. We almost lost our lives but we sure as hell learned our lesson. Time to go clear the story up with the news, hear we go again. Who knows, maybe Ill plug 1-800-genocide or cure parkinsons and see if I can get some good out of this. Or it will just be another drinking story. Either way I have a feeling this is far from the last adventure. With much love to the people who believe in me and very grateful for what Brince did, a very humble 18 yr old –Johnny Strange

The situation is actually exactly the same as the famous Richard Heaton kenendrum of february 2008.

The rectum will absorb the water and keep out many of the contaminants.

that is by definition a different situation.



You still gotta climb them... although you'd think he'd learn a little by osmosis about prepping and Plan B/C/D....



Nor me. In fact, that was one of the first thing I thought of when I saw the "7 summits" comment: "It's a little harder without a guide wiping your butt, isn't it?"


I thought they survived becuase of the helirescue.

Hey now, according to his blog / facebook, he's on the advanced program.

From his website: He started skydiving July 20th, then on Facebook September 5th he says he is starting wingsuit training.....

Here, I will help you out Strange;

Wingsuit advice

This may help you with wingsuit base even if you don't go to switzerland, since you are on the advanced program and all.

_justin

p.s. I like your video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDGHKFPlNto

EXTREME!!!!!

Thanks for sharing, everybody. Very educational thread.

check the mad freefall skills.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDGHKFPlNto

I have never heard of this Johnny Strange before....

but after some minor investigation I have concluded he might possibly be the biggest douche I have ever seen...

Me neither, but while Johnny definitely was a dumbass on this load, nothing in this story addresses anything that could be considered douche-related.

And, you know, I came down hard on him for his lack of prep, but not only did he and his mates survive their monumental mistakes... he did tell the tale straight up so we could all learn just how bad it can really get when we don't plan properly for wilderness excursions with or without parachuting equipment.

And for that he deserves thanks, not silly suppositions based on flawed extrapolation.

44

Note I said minor investigation (aka youtube/facebook stalking).

His other stuff is uber doucher. He has a video about car surfing and he just comes off as a doucher, in my opinion. Not just because he and his mates were retards, but because of all his other stuff on the interwebs.

Mat 7:1 Judge not lest ye be judged.
Just sayin.
Take care, space

Lev 19:15 "In righteousness shalt thou judge thy neighbour"
;)

I still agree with your post, though.

for someone who has climbed the seven summits, how the hell did they make such moronic decisions after the jump?

Is there a list of names somewhere? do they post here?

These guys were idiots...but YOUR crew got it shut down!

Why...are you going to out them?

But not the CO crew that got caught at the campsite without permits? Or the CO crew that was throwing crap off the cliffs and riding kids toys off the exit points?

These guys were idiots...but YOUR crew got it shut down!

JohnnyStrange : http://www.youtube.com/...#p/a/u/1/O2W1U_EcaMg.......................

What a bunch of fags.

i hope he dies on his skate board or crotch rocket...oh yheah ...

"maybe piss tastes better I have yet to try it"

I don't believe that for a second. You spend way too much time with Gee...

Shame on you PAINT.

I hope you all have handsome articulate sons and i pray they get lost in a canyon i hope you know that pain and they hurt.

Are all of you guys drama queen divas? Seriously, grow a pair.

our good friends just got lost in the valley on the way to La Mousse....