Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire I don't believe the gps was the problem

A couple left Sacramento heading toward Ft Bragg, NC and ended up stuck in snow on a mountain road in the opposite direction. I don't know what they were up to but I sure don't think a faulty gps lead them that far off course. They needed to go east but instead went northwest. They're using it to cover up either something they don't want known or blatant stupidity.

California couple rescued after GPS leads them through snow-covered mountain road
The couple had no heat, water or food, authorities said
By Stephen Sorace | Fox News

Fox News Flash top headlines for January 26
A couple in California needed a helping hand after their GPS led them onto a snow-covered mountain road where they ended up stranded on Saturday, authorities said.

Oleg Donskov called 911 after he and his wife had already been stuck in the snow for several hours on Forest Highway 7 above Masterson’s Campground, Glenn County Search and Rescue said in a news release.

Donskov and his wife were traveling from Sacramento to Fort Bragg in their sedan and had no heat, food or water, according to the department.

Rescuers said a team reached the area on four-wheel-drive Jeeps and located the couple about 30 minutes past where the road ended on a non-maintained part of the highway that was covered in almost two feet of snow.


The couple’s GPS had directed them to take this route, which they called "unpassable" during rain and snowstorms, according to authorities.

"In the event GPS directs you to a non-maintained road, it is best to turn around and ask for directions or re-route to maintained roadways," the department said.

The couple was taken to safety and given alternate directions to Fort Bragg.

Bet somebody was trying to work up a lawsuit.

Husband was trying to off the wife and got "cold feet" at the last minute?

This happens more frequently than you might think. GPS is notoriously inaccurate in some mountain areas and in large uninhabited areas of the West. Just about every winter we lose some poor soul who followed his gps out into the wilds of Wyoming up a two-track and perishes after becoming stuck.
A friend come out from Kali a couple of years back to ride along on a pronghorn hunt in the Red Desert area of Wyoming. I knew exactly where I was going and we compared it to his gps, which was at one time over 30 miles off and would try to run us down through cutbank gullies or over steep enbankments. They may be just fine for down in the city somewhere but I would never completely trust one out in the puckerbrush.

Rocky, Fort Bragg Calif. not Carolina. It is a major Forest Service/County road...it crosses the Coast Range, it has been used forever to haul a bazillion loads of logs, but is only good for about 8 months of the year. It IS a gps mapping problem and a stupid problem...we can fix the gps map problem. It is the exact same thing that happened south of your place a few years back when that Canadian couple decided to take a shortcut through Jarbidge to get to Elko from Twin Falls, in the winter. That turned out badly. Same thing happened in southern Oregon a few years back when a family decided to follow the gps from Merlin to Gold Beach. Cheap gps units like those TomTom's will kill you...IF you are stupid enough to follow them.

Look at a map. They left Sacramento and should have been on I-80 eastbound. Instead, they went NW on a completely different road and in the wrong direction. This wasn't a case of the GPS not figuring out a dirt road in Puckerbrush USA.

ROCK CHUCK - " ... They're using it to cover up either something they don't want known or blatant stupidity. ..."

Don't ever discount a man's capacity for "blatant stupidity."

L.W.

There are 2 Fort Bragg's. One back east where they talk funny, and one on the west, west of Ukiah Ca. jfc.

In the 80's I had a boss who had a very, very, pretty and incredibly ditzy wife. They left Dallas for NW Colorado and about half an hour into it he pulled over to get some sleep so he could drive the lions share of the way telling her to just stay on this road. He woke up a few hours later and she was chipper as usual saying she was making good time. He asked where they were and she said' not sure'. He could not locate themselves on the map and saw a sign saying they were entering Tulsa.

My brother tells me his wife told him North.....is always where the radiator is pointed!!

RC, Fort Bragg , California is on the northern coast of the state and is nowhere near I-80. I-80 eastbound takes you to Reno.

those gps's take away peoples brain. my camp sits down at the end of a private, mile long, windy gravel road and the road ends at my place but another road ends about 50 yards away. there is a strip of private land that has a foot path connecting the two and also goes to a river. there is no way someone could mistake the path for a road. its all of 3 feet wide with rhododendron around it like the bat cave. but gps's show the 2 roads as connected. we also have several signs all along the road saying "dead end". we have had fedex drivers drive all the way to the river bank through brush and get buried to the axles. we had a friggen tractor trailer drive down and get hung up on one of the twisty bends and get that friggen thing buried bad for 2 days blocking the road. took two front end loaders to get it out and it tore the living schit out of the place. this is not to mention all the cars that drove right to the river bank before realizing it wasn't a road. i finally put a sign up that says "your gps is wrong". still get schitheads drive down, read the sign and start down the path before they realize the sign is right.

Geez. How can a GPS miss Hwy 20 to Fort Bragg? I've deer hunted that area the couple was found. I'm surprised they had cell service.

Ok, I wasn't aware that there are 2 Ft Braggs. I was thinking of the one in NC. Even so, I don't believe that a gps lead them up a forest service road. It would take them along state and US highways, the most commonly used routes. I've been driving by gps for years. What gets you in trouble is trying to take a series of short cuts, forcing the gps to recalculate time after time. Pretty soon it's looking for any road it can find. The blatant stupidity kicks in when you leave the pavement thinking you're on a US highway.

Fort Bragg and Durham, North Carolina by way of Sacramento, CA.

TFF!

I've been to both Fort Braggs. Prefer the one on the Pacific.

Didn't they decide Bragg was a conspiracy theory and re name it?

More than one place has a public road turned private (ranch) or seasonally maintained...
I have seen quite a few signs telling people that their GPS is wrong. It is that large an issue...
But being it was NC mountains... did it happen to be a dry county?

GPS? I'm doubting that. Probably Google Maps. They ain't the same thing.

How the hell sis they get to Forrest highway 7 from Sacramento? They would have had to drive north I5 to Willows and then gone west from there. Unreal stupidity.

Young man from Argentina came to Northern California to trim marijuana. He left State Route 299 on to forest service one to the town of Mad River.
This this young man followed his phone to a motorcycle Trail into pilot creek.
He showed up at my camp early the next morning. My three Healers had him for breakfast.
Well almost!
He had flown into so cal and bought a 500$ Plymouth Voyager.
Blew a tire on the way down( about a mile).
We're talking really really steep trail.
4 quads and a 4x4.
350 ft. Of 1/4 cable.we got him out.
Same year a forest service employee wanted to use the same trail in his 2 wheel drive. I think he had been smoking pot.
At least three more people do it wanted to do the same thing.
Not one of them had a map they relied on their cell phone and Google Maps