Quicksand swallows people whole in movies, but does that happen in real life? Kind of. An experienced hiker and backpacker recently got stuck in real-life quicksand in Utah’s Arches National Park, and he took to Reddit to share his scary experience.
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Austin Dirks was embarking on a solo backpacking trip in Arches when he reached an area called Courthouse Wash. Suddenly, he says his left foot dropped to the ankle. When he shifted his weight, his right leg immediately fell through the quicksand to his knee.
“I freed the left foot, but the right stayed locked in place,” Dirks describes in a post to the sub-Reddit thread r/Garmin. “I had been in deep mud and deep sand before [and] I thought it was the same. It was not. My right leg was fixed in place as if set in concrete.”
Dirks explains how he first tried to free his leg using his trekking poles, but they too sank into the sand. After trying to free himself, he used his lifeline—his Garmin device.
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“There was no cell service, so I tried to type a SOS message on my Garmin messenger app,” Dirks explains. “The bluetooth connection failed on my phone. I painstakingly typed on the tiny Garmin with frozen fingers, 1 letter at a time. The message went out. Grand County Search and Rescue said they could not give me an estimated arrival time. I pulled dry layers from my pack, put on a melly, a fleece, and mittens, and waited.”
The Rescue
All in all, Dirks was stuck for about two hours before search and rescue (SAR) arrived. It was not easy to get his leg free, but they did, and Dirks said he didn’t have feeling in his limb for quite some time, but ultimately, he was able to hike out on his own two legs. He credits his Garmin and the SAR team for saving his life.
See footage of the hiker who got stuck in real-life quicksand in Arches National Park here:
Header stock image of Arches National Park by benedek/Getty Images
