Hunting Accidents

[desertsheep]

Since things are a little slow I was wondering how many others have had some kind of hunting related injury. Here is mine a shattered elbow from hunting coues deer in 2002.

 

We had been hunting for 6 days when my two hunting buddies decided they had better go home and get re-packed for our Mexico trip we were to leave on in 7 days. I decided to stay and hunt the last morning and if I did'nt find anything in the first couple of hours I would pack it up and head home also. I had about a two mile hike into the spot that I wanted to glass from. I had just got set up and boom there were three bucks and one looked like he was worthy of taking some lead from the 300 ultra. I put the bucks to bed and made my stalk to try and close the distance. In the time that I was making my stalk to the time I was at my pre- determined spot the bucks had gotten up and were moving out. Lucky for me they had'nt seen me get to my spot. I found the biggest of the three and let him have it he ended up scoring right at 105

 

After taking care of the deer and hanging the hind quarters in a tree I took the cape & horns and the rest of the meat and started for the truck. About a 1/2 mile from the truck I was coming down the last ridge that was steep and rocky. Something caught my foot and I ended up head & elbow first into the rocks. After laying there for a couple mintues knowing that my elbow was shattered . ( 6 previous broken arms & 1 leg helps to know ) I was laying there trying to decide if I should leave all my stuff and try to get to a hospital or just cowboy up and get to the truck. I decided I could get there and I did'nt want to leave my biggest deer at the time or my optics.

After getting to the truck and not having any cell service I started to drive home which would take me three hours or so .While I was driving home my arm started to swell I thought but after finding out later a piece of bone had cut some blood vessle's and my arm was filling up with blood. I knew it would'nt do any good to stop at a small town hospital and have them look at it so I headed for Gilbert . My in-laws ended up meeting have way and brought me some pain pills and drove me home. I had to wait for ten days for the swelling to go down before they would operate. In the mean time my buddies had returned from Mexico with some good bucks. I headed to mexico 20 days after the operation and took a buck that scored 103

 

 

One year later they took out all of the screws and wire and things are ok. Sorry to be so long winded.

 

desertsheep

[COUESAZ]

I rolled my jeep one time while archery hunting coues in highschool. We were in the wet stones in unit 34b. We waited for some friends that were about an hour behind us we flip[ped it back on the wheels and let the oils settle back and started it up and drove it home.

 

The worst was a guy that we came up on in unit 30b he was on horse back as well as us. It was on adams peak. He was lifting his buck up on his horese and the horn went in the fast draw holster and pulled the triger on his ruger 357. And shot his own thigh and it came out in his calf. We had to get him to the topof the mountain and wait for the chopper. That was a bad deal to see.he was just pumping blood out. good thing my dad was a retired policeman and an EMT He lived and is hunting again as far as i know. you sure never know what will take place.

[DEERSLAM]

Dang Jason that had to hurt.

It was good to meet you out here in CA. last week

 

So far all of my hunts have been relatively accident free. Got a little bit of a lingering shoulder pain from getting hung up in a tree while on horse back but I'll live.

[Guest Ernesto C]

Wow guys my hat off for you. Hey desertsheep nice bucks and I thougt I was the only crazy one No I haven't had any accidents but a couple years ago I got out of surgery room at 11:00 am....at 7:00 pm we were driving towards Wyoming,drove all night long the following day at 9:00 am I was harvesting my fourth antelope and I was thinking I was crazy but I think you beat me up

 

Ernesto C

[crotalus]

Wow !! Those are some sick stories. Desertsheep what happened to the deer's hind quarters you left hanging on the tree? I was hunting in 30B with my Dad and brother once. My father connected on a coues and while we were loading it onto the horse, the horse went off and kicked my bro real hard in the thigh. Thought for sure he broke his femur but after the dust settled we were all none worst for the scare, thought he almost lost his nads. Ernesto, you must be a man's man. Cannot even imagine traveling all night, much less after a vasectomy. All joking aside sure glad no tragic endings to any of the stories so far. Thanxs for sharing.

Ernest

[Kilimanjaro]

Well guys, I have told this one once before once here i beleive, but here goes again... you're in for a long one....

When I was guiding in New Zealand back in 2001, we had a chance to get in a good hunt or two for ourselves while we were down there. We had already done a backpack tahr hunt earlier and after a couple of months of hard work, we decided we were going to do a Chamois hunt. We made the drive to the pilot's house that afternoon and loaded all the gear into the chopper. The plan was for myself and George to fly into the area, hunt for 4 days, and then when Jamie was going to fly back into the area, pick us up, and leave Allen (George's Dad) and a client there in the already established camp that we were to leave... So, we load up and fly a LONG ways into the Southrn Alps. We get to the landing area, put the bird down and start unloading gear as fast as we could because it was raining and getting dark quick and Jamie wanted to get outta there before the weather got any worse. He said his goodbyes and goodlucks, and said he'll be back in 5 days to do the swap. So, George and I got camp set up, and got stuff ready for the start of the hunt in the morn. Thats when we realized that we had forgot the emergency radio in the rush to unload the chopper. Oh well, lets no worry too much about it..

Next morn, we start the hunt by hunting the drainage above camp. A few hours into the hunt, we see a small mob of good Chamois up the drainage and several great bull tahr further up the mountain. After a couple of hours of postioning, we are finally within range of the Chamois.. To make a long story a little shorter, I make the best shot of my life and anchor a great chamois from 420 yrds away across a deep gourge. After a couple of hrs of some serious climbing, we make it to the chamois, take a ton of pics in the rain, and cape and quarter him. It was still reasonably early (1:30 or so) so we don the now heavy packs and head on uphill to see if we can find those tahr bulls we had glassed earlier. After a couple more hours of hard hiking, no luck.. So, we make the decision to start making our way back to camp which is now a good 2 hr hike below us.. We are also taking a diff way down than the way we came up in hopes of running into the tahr. We come to really steep wall that is pretty much sheer with just a foot wide trail worn into the rock from the tahr. George goes across first and makes it. He says it's just too dangerous to try and sugested I find an altarnate route. We find a slightly less of a sheer drop-off a little further down. I start across the trail, and am about halfway when all heck breaks loose..

The trail that I was walking on crumbles and breaks free and pulls my left foot off the trail completely. This in turn makes me loose balance and then because of the 50 or so pounds in my packframe, throws me right off the cliff before I can do anything. I free fall for about 35 ft before hitting the bottom of the cliff and then begin an out of control end-over-end series of cartwheels down the scree slope. After a couple of hundred feet of this, I finally hit a rock big enough to stop me. At first I didn't realize anything was wrong. I tried to stand up and play it off. Not a chance.. I fell back down and began to see that I had alot more than just a few cuts and bumps. After George made his way down to me, we began to realize that we were in a really bad situation. I had broke my right ankle, totally dislocated my left hip, torn all my glut muscles from the bone on the right side of my butt, fractured my pelvis in 4 spots, and had several serious cuts on various spots all over me and was bleeding everywhere. After we saw that I was not going to die of internal bleeding, Geoge tried something that I will never forget. He put me on my back, put his foot in my stomach, and tried for all he was worth to pull my hip back into socket. Let me tell you, I think I saw the Lord's face! I was on the verge of going out. The pain was undescrible. After several failed attempts we made the decision that George would take off to camp and bring what he could back up to me. With that, when George was about to leave he said that I had to make it to the flat area about 200 yrds below where I landed. 200 long yards of large boulders all at a steep angle downhill. And with that, I began a crawl that was out of this world. Lets just say that the pain was so bad on this crawl, I was begging to die right there. I finally made the 200 yards in about 2 hours. Geoge showed back up shortly thereafter and made camp. From there we made the decision that it would be too dangerous for George to try and hike out of there alone. We decided to wait it out till Jamie was to show back up and pick up up. The next 4 days went as slowly as a day could ever go. Constant rain, absolutely no pain meds, and nothing to do but lie in my one man tent and wait it out. Lets just say that those 4 days are real fuzzy in my mind!

Finally on the fourth day, I heard the sweetest sound I had ever heard in my entire life.. Jamie in the chopper.. They had found us. Because the drainage was so steep, he could not put the bird down. He had to stay in and keep it at full power with just one skid on the ground as George and Allen loaded loaded me up. After we got airborne, Jamie radioed what had happened to the nearest clinic and told them that we were on our way. Jamie landed the helo right onto the lawn of the clinic. They were waiting for us. They got me unloaded and took me in. After several tests, they concluded that I was in far worse shape that first realized. They then radioed for the Lifeflight chopper out of Christchurch. Soon, the Lifeflight was there and I was on my way to the big hospital. I was given a horse's size dose of Morphine on the way over there. Once there, they wheeled me in a concluded that I had sustained a good amount of internal bleeding as well as all the other bad things that I mentioned earlier. I was wheeled into surgary and had the ankle set in a cast, the hip put back into place, and had my glute muscle reattached to the floor of my pelvis. NOT FUN!!! I was in the hospital for 9 days in the same ward as all the old men that had fallen and hurt their hips and such. I was the youngest person on the floor by 50 yrs! Talk about snoring and griping!!

I caught up with every TV show on every channel, and became quite accquainted with several of the cute Kiwi nurses who had to sponge bath me!! And on top of that, I was interviewed by the local news station. They had heard about my fall and they just happed to be doing a special about the recent rash of climbing deaths in the region! Go figure. I was local celeb for the day when the news came on later that night!! Ended up being that there had been 10 deaths in that area since the begining of the year. I was one of the lucky ones.

After 9 LONG days in the hospital, I was finally let out. My buddy Billy, who was there guiding with me, picked me up and took me back to the lodge 5 hours away. Talk about a long 10 days!

In the end, I ended up staying there for another couple of months and just helping with the skinning and such. Cuz I sure as heck couldn't do any guiding! We even went to Austrailia for a week. I just hobbled around the beach on my crutches and played the sempathy card with all the hot Aussie girls!!

And luckiest of all, my traveler's insurance covered everything.. Lifeflight, hospital bills, etc... Trust me, if ya ever go out of the country, the smartest thing you can do is buy some insurance. You never know what will happen. And because I couldn't bend at the hip for long periods, the insurance company got ahold of Air New Zealand and arranged for me to fly all the way back to TX in first class! Now that was livin!!

Got back and began the LONG road of physical rehab. LONG ROAD!! I was in that for a long time. But, time heals and as of today, I am completely healed up. The hip bother me a little when the weather changes, but I get it checked out twice per year, and as of now, i am good to go.

 

I told you it was long, but that's my crazy, tell-the-grandkids, hunting accident of mine!!

[az4life]

Wow

Scottyboy, I don't think anyone can top that story, (or would want to) but let's hear some second place efforts.

[DEERSLAM]

Dang that tops most stories ScottyBoy. Glad to hear you've made a full recovery.

[Guest Ernesto C]

I told you guys..........no body mess with Texas! You really are blessed Scotty.

[desertsheep]

crotalus,

 

The hind quarters in the tree I marked with my gps so I could make a return trip the same day. After the fall and I had gone to the hospital. My wife and I made it home around 4:00AM. The next day around 2:00 Pm one of my hunting buddies and I went back and he hiked in with my gps to get the meat. I stayed in the truck with a radio to make sure he got out ok. He made it back to the truck around 10:00 PM. It was raining really hard that night and we decided to try and go in a differnt way. We thought that it might be a shorter hike but you know how those things work out. We ended up back at the house around 1:00 AM.

 

desertsheep

[TwoGuns]

Since there is not much else to talk about these days, gory hunting stories are always great to hear. Fortunately, I have nothing really exciting to tell about myself, but my cousin in flagstaff has an incredible story to tell. Back in about 1995, him and some buddies were camped near stoneman lake. While hiking along the rim around the lake, a tree branch broke, sending him backwards off of a cliff. He fell about 15 feet and hit a shelf, then fell another 75 feet straight down into the brush and rocks. He landed on his knees and blew up his hips and busted just about every bone below his shoulders. Several compound fractures in his lower legs. He was really fortunate that he didnt rip an artery and bleed out. His buddies heard him scream as he fell, and went to try and find him. They found him unconscious in the brush, but could hardly even get through to him. One of them hit the road and had to drive 20 minutes or so to use a phone and call 911. It was over an hour before the ambulance arrived on the scene and took the emt's 2 hours to use chain saws to cut the brush away to get to him. Then, they could not fit him into the chopper because when he landed, one leg went one way and the other went a different way. So, they had to drive him in an ambulance to phoenix straight into surgery. He had too many injuries and shattered bones to list, and was in surgery for 12 hours. He had tons of surgeries afterward to fix things, and still has tons of titanium in him and scars that run the entire length of his legs. Amazingly, he is pretty ok these days. After lots of time in a wheel chair and rehab, he is doing great. God really protected him that day, cause all it would have taken was a rock at the bottom. His dad, my uncle, actually went out to where he fell and measured how high the cliff was from where he fell off to where he landed.....90'.

[wklman]

Man, you guys have some gory stories.Almost makes me want to quit hunting and take up basketweavin'.The worst thing that happened to me was when I was 14 yrs old on my first whitetail hunt.It had rained the night before and everything was pretty slick. I was out hunting with my brothers rifle when I slipped and went head over heels on some rocks.good thing I had my brothers winchester to break my fall though.I was no worse for wear but I couldn't say the same for the gun.I had broke the stock nearly in 2 and put 2 huge gouges in it.I think if my brother was along I wouldn't be here today.

 

Wade

[CouesWhitetail]

Wow!! those are some seriously hard times! Glad you guys all pulled through. What a mess..... Scottyboy your story reminded me of the guy who fell into a crevasse on Everest and he had to crawl back to camp. His crawl was a lot farther but I am not sure his injuries were as bad as yours. And Desertsheep that is one ugly photo you posted there!

 

I can't wait to hear what Quimby has for stories along this line.....

 

Amanda

[1stcoues75]

in 2004 while carrying my coues back to the truck, my right foot slipped out in front of me and trapped my left leg behind me and messed up the cartliage that wasnt in good shape to begin with. good thing i was schedualed to have it scoped a week later so all is well now.

[crotalus]

Double WOW and Doh!!! to all the stories... most of this stuff I thought only happened in the "movies". Man... sure makes ya count your blessings if you only had a twisted ankle. DEDICATION and RESPONSIBLITY is what I'm talking about Desertsheep, very impressive and respectful, glad you were able to make it back all the way around.