Setting out for a Central California sightseeing Sunday drive with no particular destination in mind, Jarrod and Jennifer Hanson left their modest new home near the Kings River, entertaining Jennifer’s elderly mother, Carol Taylor, on her first visit to California following the arrival of their first baby, born three months earlier. A lifelong flatlander, Carol suggested a spontaneous excursion to the foothills, visible so close by. From the Valley, the view magnetized her, seeming to Carol impossibly majestic as they towered to well over 14,000 feet.

Why not go along and make his mother-in-law’s day, possibly her whole trip, Jarrod thought.

Jennifer didn’t want to seem like the over-fretful new mom, but she was less enthusiastic, nervous by nature in unfamiliar settings.

Not wanting to disappoint the others, Jennifer consented. The whole round trip would just take a couple of hours at most, she rationalized. And having her veteran mom along for advice with her new baby, Kylie, Jennifer had ample confidence for what was the baby’s first road trip beyond their routine jaunts to the market or visits to her pediatrician.

Now in her mid-70s, the thin and energetic Carol, a small business owner, had traveled little over the years. For the moment, however, she was footloose and feeling glad to be away from the Plains State for the first time in a long time.

Unfortunately, Jarrod’s GPS device offered more confidence than accurate information as the group wended higher into the hills. Some roads that were prompted by the device proved phantom, others little more than wide trails. Yet other prompted directions would have sent the travelers over cliffs, washed-out paths or boulder-strewn flats that didn’t appear to have been roads—ever.

Dressed appropriately for outdoors on a moderately cool fall day in the Valley, the group was relatively scantily clad for higher elevation temperatures. They climbed upward along winding, Manzanita-spotted hairpin turns on steep inclines and increasingly rough road. The mer- cury dropped along with the sun, now sinking in the pink western sky behind the Coast Range, visible from the clear, cold Sierra.

Sure, they were lost, the normally easygoing Jarrod would admit. But you just turn around and head downward, back from wherever you came—wherever that was.

Still having a good time and chatting noisily, they were unable to hear the car radiator’s hissing. But soon the switchbacks slowed them enough to see it had begun emitting a little steam—which, it had been doing for a few days, a fact that that Jennifer had forgotten to mention to Jarrod before they set out that day. They would soon discover that it had cracked. With a minor explosion jolting nerves and steam now boil- ing out from under the hood, the off-guard Jarrod tried to pull quickly to the side of the narrow, dirt and gravel road.

Discombobulated, he misjudged the shadowy, soggy shoulder, now a deep red, iron-rich brick color darkened by recent rains. The car was not only broken down, but now stuck in a soft, muddy roadside culvert. Not that it mattered much. “Stuck two ways is still just stuck,”

he fumed to Jennifer, irritated after she—who didn’t know a lot about cars—sheepishly offered her diagnosis of the engine problem.

“I remember just a little steam coming out from under the front of the hood when I pulled into work on Friday,” she granted, omitting that she had noticed a wisp or two the prior couple of days, as well.

The group was now stranded, with virtually no homes or shelter within miles. Jarrod had taken turns suggested by the GPS system, led to an elevation of well over 4,500 feet, to no place they wanted to be in the darkening, cold, moonless night. Mid-30s were expected on the Valley floor overnight. But at this elevation, microclimate temperatures can differ widely, depending on which side of a mountain you are on, for example. It is often well below freezing this time of year.

All three adults had their cell phones. Too bad they were well out of range of any cellular service.

Furthermore, no one except Jennifer’s stockbroker sister in Los Angeles knew the group’s afternoon plan. She knew only that the group had gone sightseeing, not exactly where. Nor had Jennifer known their itinerary when the two instant messaged via Facebook a few days prior.

They were now on their own with only their wits, light clothing, a baby blanket and the inert car for warmth. At least Jennifer had bundled up Kylie pretty well before departing the house.

Much can be learned from their plight.

“Young children’s heads have a proportionally larger surface area for their size than either adults or older children,” says Jim Andrews. M.D., Medical Director for the Fresno-based Central California Emergency Services Agency (CCEMSA). “This makes them more susceptible to heat loss or heat gain if not properly clothed. In addition, nonverbal children cannot communicate their needs and discomforts as well as adults or verbal children.” The mistake is thinking, “If I am warm, my baby is warm.” Dr. Andrews says that is not necessarily the case.

Like the very young, the elderly are vulnerable. They share similarly limited physical reserves, says Dr. Andrews, but are also more likely to be taking various medications that affect survival issues like those posed by hypothermia (the medical term for the body’s inability to maintain high enough temperature). “The elderly tend to have more medical conditions and take more medication that can interfere with appro- priate thermoregulation, both hot and cold,” Dr. Andrews points out, adding that malnutrition, a fixed or limited income, or inability to pay the electric bill cause problems in both winter and summer.”

The mountain setting of the opening scenario is not the only threatposed to Valley residents. Our urban environments are just as likely to yield grim statistics, if not more so. “(Hypothermia incidents) are more common than readers might think,” says Dr. Andrews. “Elderly people who live alone can become incapacitated. Drug and alcohol users pass out outside, ill or demented people who live alone can run into unde- tected or unanticipated troubles, too, he says.

Contrary to the myth, alcohol only makes the cold person sense warmth, as the intoxicated person may feel that warmth leaving the body. “Alcohol use, which is a vasodilator, causes heat to be lost from the body more rapidly, making people more susceptible to hypother- mia,” he says, contrary to images of cowboys with whiskey by the fire on a cold prairie night.

Rivers, swimming pools, heating malfunctions, or power outages are just a few other risks to consider.

How to Stay Warm and Ward Off Hypothermia:

Dr. Jim Andrews, Medical Director for the Fresno-based Central California Emergency Services Agency, says you need to think about three things: Getting your body to make more heat, get- ting more heat from an outside source, and losing less heat from your body to the outside world.

1. Bring extra clothing along on outdoor trips—even on day hikes. You could get lost or something unexpected might hap- pen. Wet clothing conducts heat away from the body much more rapidly than cold air of the same temperature.

2. Bring matches so you can start a fire if needed. Bring warm liquids, too, to add body heat. 3. Find shelter. 4. Stay dry.

5. If you are with others, share body heat. Depending on who is in the group, you may need to overcome social hesitations to do this. 6. Be aware. “It won’t happen to us,” or “We’ll only be outside for a little while,” are two common beliefs that often precede cold weather emergencies.

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