Aaron's Own Account of His Ordeal
Under a bluebird sky out in the desert, I leave my truck where the trail begins for Horseshoe Canyon. My plan is to make a 30-mile circuit cycling up Horshoe Canyon, leaving the bike at the top and then coming down Blue John Canyon on foot.
Though the Blue John circuit will be only a day trip, I'm carrying a 13 kilo pack, most of the weight taken up with climbing gear for descending the steep canyon system, food, and four litres of water.
By 2:30,
I yank* my arm three times in a futile attempt to pull it out from under the rock. But I'm stuck. My immediate worry is water. My next thought is escape. Eliminating ideas that are just too dumb (like breaking open my AA batteries on the boulder and hoping the acid* eats into the stone but not my arm), I decide to try to chip away the rock around my hand with my multitool knife. My hand is trapped too high up so I can't lie down, and as soon as my knees bend and my weight pulls on my wrist* the pain is agonizing. Key word Vocabulary
boulder - a huge rock
yank - pull
futile - pointless, hopeless
acid - chemical with low pH; opp. of alkali
wrist - the joint that connects the hand to the rest of the arm
I speak slowly out loud: "You're gonna have to cut your arm off."
I take my multitool and, without thinking, open the long blade*. I hold it with the blade against the upper part of my forearm. Surprising myself, I press on the blade and slowly draw it across my forearm. Huh. I press harder. No cut, no blood, nothing. Back and forth, I vigorously saw at my arm, growing more frustrated with each attempt. The damn blade won't even break the skin.
DAY FIVE
Slowly, I become aware of the cold stare of the second shorter blade of my knife. I hesitate. Then I violently thrust the blade down, burying it in the meat of my forearm. "Holy crap, Aaron," I say out loud. There is barely any sensation of the blade below skin level. My nerves seem to be concentrated in the outer layers of my arm. I open an inch-wide hole and note that there is remarkably little blood; the capillaries* must have closed down for the time being. Ouch.
Color bursts in my mind, and then I walk through the canyon wall, stepping into a living room. The boy is my own. I bend to lift him up with my left arm, using my handless right arm to balance him, and we laugh together as I swing him up to my shoulder.
That belief, that boy, changes everything for me.
Sip* after sip of acidic urine has left my mouth sore. I can't hold my head upright; it leans against the canyon wall. Out of curiosity, I poke my thumb with my knife blade twice. The second time the blade breaks the skin as if it were cutting into butter, and there is a hiss of gas escaping. I scream out in pure hate, shrieking as I hit my body against the canyon walls. And then I feel my arm bend unnaturally. If I bend my arm far enough, I can break my forearm bones. I put my left hand under the boulder and push hard, harder, HARDER! Sweating and euphoric, I touch my right arm. Both bones have broken in the same place, just above my wrist.
The skin hurt quite a lot but the muscles don't hurt as much. A really tough part is the tendon because the knife just won't cut through it. I try to cut through it as fast as possible and I suddenly feel as if my entire arm has been thrust into a tub* of boiling water - the sensation of burning shooting up my arm.
Now there are only a few more sections of muscle, a little bit of skin left. I drop back against the canyon wall and for the first time in six days my feet are in a different part of the canyon than where I had been trapped.
Keyword Vocabulary
blade - the sharp part of the knife used for cutting
fist - a closed hand
wound - cut in the skin
capillaries - the smallest blood vessels
harness - straps around the waist and thighs used by climbers to tie the rope to
trance - dreaming while you are awake
forearm - between the wrist and the elbow
tourniquet - device to stop an arm or leg bleeding
pliers - tool for pulling out nails or cutting wire
tub - huge bowl or barrel
