New progress in the search and rescue in Ailao Mountain! Experts tell us: How dangerous is field scientific research?

Lost contact in Ailao Mountain

4 geological survey personnel

Always touched everyone's heart

As of 22nd

4 people have been missing for 9 days

Heart-wrenching

Good news from the search and rescue front line!

On the 20th, rescuers found a raincoat of the missing person during the search. Together with a raincoat found not long ago, these two raincoats became new clues in the search and rescue process of the missing person. At 5 a.m. on the 21st, a commando team formed by the Yunnan Pu'er Forest Fire Brigade rushed to the discovery site to conduct a search.

Liu Dongjun, political commissar of Pu'er City Forest Fire Brigade, introduced that the place where the raincoat was found was located in the Baishui River in Zhedong Town, Zhenyuan County, Pu'er City , downstream of the simple camping shack of the missing persons. About 1 kilometer downstream along the river, another raincoat was found at the intersection of two streams, and the feces of the missing persons were also found nearby.

In addition, the reporter learned from the Pu'er City Fire Rescue Detachment that the terrain of Ailao Mountain is special, and the search terrain has a slope of 60 to 80 degrees. Rescuers can only bend down or crawl forward, which takes a very long time. At the same time, rescuers need to carry supplies, and if weather permits, supplies will be delivered by helicopter.

In addition, there is a large temperature difference between day and night, with the temperature at night only 7 degrees Celsius, so rescue workers need to guard against hypothermia.

Next, according to the work arrangements of the Yunnan Provincial Party Committee and the Provincial Government, the Yunnan Provincial Fire Rescue Corps will change from tracking clues to a point-by-point, carpet-style detailed search, and continue to use the "Two-Bu Road" outdoor software, Beidou active terminals, GPS navigators and other positioning and real-time mapping search area methods. With supply point No. 2 (the last fire point where the missing persons were found) as the center, searches will be conducted in five areas in the direction of Xinping in Ailao Mountain, without missing any gullies, caves, traces or any suspicious areas. At the same time, the professional advantages of the National Mountain Rescue Kunming Brigade will be fully utilized, and a key search within a radius of 3 kilometers will be carried out with supply point No. 2 as the core.

On November 21, the contour map of Ailao Mountain, with the traces left by the missing persons marked in green and purple. Source: Zhenyuan County Party Committee Propaganda Department

Timeline of events

Around 9:00 on the 13th——

The four missing persons entered the Ailao Mountains for field work and planned to go down the mountain on the afternoon of the 13th or the morning of the 14th. They only brought one day's dry food with them and no satellite phones.

13th

The missing person made a phone call to the outside world after entering the mountain to work, and lost contact with the driver at the foot of the mountain on the 14th.

19:28 on the 15th

Upon receiving the report, the People's Government of Zhenyuan County organized the province, city, county, town and village to mobilize more than 1,000 search and rescue personnel, more than 110 vehicles, 14 satellite phones, 5 drones, 2 helicopters and related materials and technical equipment to carry out search and rescue efforts.

16th

Rescuers found signs of life such as fire in the mountains, as well as red paint, red bags, machetes, mineral water bottles, etc. for marking.

18th

Some villagers reported seeing smoke from the fire, and search and rescue personnel immediately began searching the surrounding area.

19th

A total of more than 370 search and rescue personnel were deployed to form 8 search and rescue teams, and they used helicopters, drones, search and rescue dogs and other equipment to carry out full search and rescue.

14:00 on the 19th

The relevant search and rescue team found traces of outdoor dining and mineral water bottles of suspected missing persons.

17:00 on the 20th

The missing persons have not been found yet.

November 20

The search and rescue personnel found the raincoat of the missing person during the operation.

Firefighters, armed police, local villagers and others formed a search and rescue team to search for the missing persons in Ailao Mountain. Source: Zhenyuan County Media Center

What difficulties are there in search and rescue work?

Ailao Mountain is located in central Yunnan. It is the dividing line between the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau and the Hengduan Mountains. It is also the largest original evergreen broad-leaved forest area in the country, with a maximum altitude of 3,156 meters. The area where the missing persons are located is the Ailao Mountain National Nature Reserve, with an average altitude of more than 2,500 meters. There are currently three major difficulties in the search and rescue work:

First, the area of ​​Ailao Mountain in Zhenyuan is 135,000 mu. The area where the people lost contact this time is located in the core area of ​​Ailao Mountain National Nature Reserve, which is an uninhabited area of ​​​​primeval forest. The mountains are steep, the forests are dense, and there are cliffs and gullies everywhere. The terrain is extremely complex.

Second, it is the beginning of winter and the temperature difference between day and night is large, reaching around 20 degrees during the day and dropping to seven or eight degrees at night. The trees in the mountainous areas are tall and dense, and there has been continuous rainfall in recent days, so there is fog in the forest and visibility is extremely low.

Third, the search and rescue route is long. It takes about 4 hours of climbing from the foot of the mountain to the search area. As the search range continues to expand, there are no roads in the mountains, making travel difficult. There are no conditions for nighttime search, and it takes a long time for the team members to travel to and from the lodging.

On November 21, search and rescue personnel marched in the Ailao Mountains. Source: Publicity Department of Zhenyuan County Party Committee

Zhang Zhaohui, executive deputy county magistrate of Zhenyuan County and executive deputy commander of the search and rescue headquarters, introduced that in response to these situations, the rescue headquarters established multiple supply stations on the mountain tops and built simple sheds. Search and rescue personnel can spend the night on the mountain in sleeping bags, and use helicopter airdrops to improve search and rescue efficiency and carry out rescue operations with all their strength.

"We will not miss any gully, cave or any suspicious area. As long as there is a glimmer of hope, we will do our best to carry out search and rescue," said Yang Lei.

On November 21, the rescue team searched for the missing persons in Ailao Mountain. Source: Publicity Department of Zhenyuan County Party Committee

On November 20, the local rescue team clarified their mission before departure. Source: Zhenyuan County Party Committee Propaganda Department

What equipment has been invested?

Yang Lei, deputy director of the Combat Training Department of the Yunnan Provincial Fire Rescue Corps, who is currently carrying out rescue operations at the scene, said that drones equipped with thermal imaging cameras and search and rescue dogs have been put into the search and rescue work.

"In areas such as cliffs and gullies, rescue workers released thermal imaging drones to conduct surround shooting and search for clues to heat sources. However, because the forest is extremely dense, the drones cannot capture images of the forest floor from the air, and the effect is limited," said Yang Lei.

On November 21, helicopters dropped supplies over Ailao Mountain. Source: Zhenyuan County Party Committee Propaganda Department

At the same time, the fire rescue team deployed five search and rescue dogs, first giving the missing persons' belongings to the dogs as a scent source, and then the trainers led them to search in key areas. "The area is too large, and the search and rescue dogs have to work within a range of more than ten square kilometers, which is completely different from traditional flat ground searches and ruins searches," said Yang Lei.

Zhang Zhaohui said that in recent days, helicopters have been flying in key areas to shout and search, but no useful clues have been found, and no feedback such as fireworks or distress patterns has been received. "Jungle search and rescue is very special, and human search and rescue is still the main means." Zhang Zhaohui said.

At 00:00 on November 22, the search and rescue team was sorting out their lighting equipment and preparing to set off. Photo by Beijing News reporter Li Yang

On November 21, the government organized local villagers to carry supplies into the mountains to the supply point. Source: Zhenyuan County Party Committee Propaganda Department

In terms of communication support, Zhang Zhaohui introduced that a "Yulong" drone carrying an aerial communication base station arrived in Zhenyuan County on the 21st and carried out flight operations on the same day. China Mobile Yunnan Company has dispatched emergency satellite communication vehicles to Zhenyuan, Xinping and Shuangbai.

A plan view of the rescue progress on November 21. Photo by Beijing News reporter Li Yang

Experts tell us how dangerous field expeditions are

For many researchers, field expeditions are an important means of obtaining first-hand research data. So, what dangers may field expeditions face? How can we better prevent and deal with these dangers?

China Science News interviewed four scientists who have experience in field research. Their passion for scientific research led them to explore remote forests, snow-capped mountains and deserts. Although they have different specialties, they have a common aspiration: "Field research cannot tolerate any carelessness."

The following are their accounts of their field research experiences:

Tick ​​bite and king cobra encounter

Tan Yunhong (Deputy Director of the Integrated Conservation Center of Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Head of the Plant Diversity and Conservation Research Group)

In 2016, scientific expedition members from the Xishuangbanna Botanical Garden traveled through the dense forests of Myanmar after a recent rain. Photo courtesy of Tan Yunhong

I work in plant diversity conservation and have been conducting field research for more than 15 years. I started working in the tropical rainforests of northern Myanmar in 2014. In 2016, the Southeast Asia Biodiversity Research Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences was officially established at the Xishuangbanna Botanical Garden. I go there twice a year with the team. Now I spend more than half of my time in the wild.

When it comes to tropical rainforests, the first thing that comes to mind is that they are a paradise for plants and animals. But for scientific expedition members, the risks are directly proportional to the richness of the research resources.

The rainy season in tropical rainforests is relatively long, and Myanmar is one of the regions with the highest rainfall in the world. Sometimes, we worked in the forest for half a month and it rained every day. Due to the huge rainfall in an instant, landslides, surging rivers, and the destruction of roads and bridges are very common and we encounter them every year.

In the rainforest, the thing that really makes us feel creepy is the tick. It may carry the forest encephalitis virus, which is fatal. Over the years, my teammates and I have been bitten by ticks too many times, but fortunately, we have never had serious symptoms.

But in July this year, I returned to Lhasa from a scientific expedition in southern Tibet. I suddenly started to have a fever, my whole body was cold, and I couldn't get up after falling down. I felt that the situation was not good, so I hurried back to Kunming for treatment. At this time, about 10 days had passed since I fell ill, and a rash began to appear on my body.

In Kunming, the doctor told me that my condition was critical, that all the indicators in my blood tests were abnormal, and that they suspected that I had an acute blood disease. So, I was transferred to the infectious disease department.

At that time, a more experienced doctor asked me if I had been bitten by insects, and I highly suspected that it was a tick. Therefore, he immediately asked me to take two targeted antibiotics, tetracycline and doxycycline. However, these two drugs can only be taken for one week. If they are not effective, it means that the situation is very serious and a full body examination and treatment must be done. After four days, my fever finally subsided, but the drug treatment still had serious liver side effects.

However, a former British colleague of mine was not so lucky. Because tick bites are very secretive and there are no special symptoms in the early stage, she was negligent for a while and missed the best time for treatment. Later, she fell into a coma and became a vegetable. She has not woken up yet.

In addition to ticks, it is also common to encounter snakes in the wild. There are some highly venomous snakes in the rainforest. If you are bitten by a snake and cannot receive treatment within two hours, there is no chance of survival.

A well-known herpetology expert from the California Academy of Sciences was accidentally bitten by a venomous snake while conducting a grape expedition in northern Myanmar. However, because he was deep in the forest, no one could help him, and he fell into a coma two hours later and eventually died in a foreign land.

I once encountered a venomous king cobra, and was only one step away from it. Fortunately, I walked very carefully and did not take the last step forward, otherwise I would have probably...

If we were conducting scientific research in China, we might be able to respond to emergencies, but in the rainforests of northern Myanmar, where villages have barely developed in the past 100 years, transportation is inconvenient, and there are no medical facilities, we can only leave it to fate if we encounter a serious disease.

We rarely talk about these topics among our colleagues, and our families are not very clear about our real working environment. Many new team members did not dare to communicate with their families at the beginning, for fear that their families would not agree to their going out to the wild. There are also many young students who were very enthusiastic and interested at first, but after experiencing several field work, they could not bear the pressure and risks of such work and made other choices.

We are doing plant diversity protection, and we cannot rely on monitoring equipment such as infrared cameras. We have to measure everything on foot. It is not easy to retain students in this major, and we understand that. I myself have faced other choices, and I persisted because I really like it. I can't bear to give up.

When I was young, I didn't feel any psychological burden when I followed my teacher. Now that I lead my own team, I feel a great sense of responsibility. Therefore, I also hope that for those scientific expeditions that require higher risks, they can get support from professional doctors accompanying the team, and they can also receive regular training on medical first aid knowledge. In addition, whether some commercial insurance that can cover the risks of foreign scientific expeditions can be provided is also a question worthy of attention.

Almost fell off the cliff, occasionally encountered a dead body

Ma Ming (Researcher at Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences)

From October to November 2005, Ma Ming and his scientific expedition team conducted a scientific expedition at Tomur Peak in Tianshan Mountains (Ma Ming is the second from the right). Photo courtesy of Ma Ming

One year, when I was doing a snow leopard survey, I climbed up a cliff alone. I was very tired after climbing up, so I wanted to stop and rest for a while, so I leaned against the mountain with my back facing the cliff. Unexpectedly, a very strong wind suddenly blew from the side, and I couldn't stand and stumbled forward.

The cliff was dozens of meters high. If I fell down, I would definitely die. I broke out in a cold sweat. To be honest, my legs were shaking and I couldn't hold on mentally or physically. After that, I was extra careful and took a break to let my muscles recover before going down the mountain.

I was almost 50 years old at that time, and I was probably a little careless. I didn't expect that I would be physically exhausted, nor did I expect such a strong wind to blow over. In the wild, many problems arise because of carelessness at the beginning. So, you can't be careless at all.

We have been investigating snow leopards for about 10 years, and we have been going to places like Tianshan, Altai, and Kunlun, which are all around 3,000 meters above sea level. This is because animals like snow leopards and vultures live in such high altitude areas. We want to see where they prefer to walk, where they hunt or rest. Just like Sherlock Holmes investigating a case, we look for clues and traces of them, such as footprints, urine, feces, claw marks, etc.

In order to find more traces, the team will divide the work. Everyone is not in the same place: some are on both sides of the river, some are on the ridge, in the valley, and some are on the cliff or under the cliff...

It is usually better to look for snow leopard footprints after snowfall. The footprints left on the ground are fresh after snowfall. If it has been a long time, the footprints will overlap and you will not know whether it is the same leopard or multiple leopards. Therefore, we usually use the post-snow survey method. But on the other hand, the cliff is not easy to climb after snowfall. It is slippery and dangerous.

In the past, field expeditions encountered many dangers, such as when we climbed rocks with bare hands. In addition to that time, I was out of water and food when crossing the no-man's land, and when I was climbing a poplar tree, the trunk broke and I fell from the tree seven or eight meters high, and my mount (a skinny horse) bit my back...

Occasionally we would come across corpses. Once I was resting in a ravine in Kunlun Mountain, and suddenly I found a corpse in a stone cave next to me. Judging from the teeth, the person was not very old. We guessed that the person might have entered the ravine and was caught in a flood, and then starved to death in the cave. When we were investigating in Lop Nur, we occasionally came across corpses. Maybe some of them got lost? After so many years of field research, I feel that life is really very fragile. In a moment, a few seconds, you may be dead. That's how it is.

Later, when we went hiking, we would find some professional mountaineers to give us some outdoor training, with safety ropes, spiked shoes, etc. Nowadays, most people don’t do trace investigations, but use infrared cameras, satellite tracking, and molecular technology. This is simpler and more accurate.

Being dragged by a horse for more than ten meters, walking for three days to cross the snowy mountain

Liu Bing (Assistant Researcher, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences)

Liu Bing took a photo of his teammates while hiking along the Yarlung Zangbo River in August 2009. Photo courtesy of Liu Bing

The first long scientific expedition I participated in was a trip to Xinjiang in July 2007. On that trip, a joint Chinese-Russian expedition team conducted a flora survey in the Altai Mountains and collected plant specimens.

We had to go north from the northernmost part of Habahe County in Altay Prefecture, a place called Baihaba. Cars could only drive a short distance, so we started riding horses from a place called Narenxia Pasture and headed towards Nelson. It took three days of riding, more than ten hours a day on horseback, which was very tiring. After three days, the crotch of my pants was worn out.

I had no experience riding a horse at that time. The guide taught me a few moves, such as squeezing the horse's belly with both legs to make it move forward, and pulling the reins up to stop it. I was a little scared on the first day of riding a horse because we were walking on a mountain road and the horses were very tall. Especially when going downhill, I was always afraid of falling off when sitting on the saddle. Later, I got used to it and it got better.

After that expedition, I rode a horse when I visited Inner Mongolia and Yunnan, but I haven’t ridden a horse since 2014, because many roads have been repaired.

However, in the southwest region, although the roads are getting better and better every year, some sections are occasionally washed away during the rainy season every summer.

In August 2009, we went to Medog County in Tibet for an inspection. Medog County is the last county in China to be connected by road. As early as 1994, the road from Bomi County to Medog County was built once. A car drove in, and then the road was cut off. It was cut off for more than ten years, and the car was placed in the county town, becoming a cultural relic. Because there was only that one car in the entire county town.

When we went to investigate in 2009, the road there was repaired again, so our car could drive in. After two days of investigation around the county, we needed to continue to go south, to the direction of Beibeng Township. As a result, after driving a few kilometers, the two experienced drivers with 30 years of driving experience were afraid to drive. They said, "We can't treat the lives of you researchers as a joke. You should walk over there. We can't drive." The road is as wide as the car, with a cliff on the left and the abyss of the Yarlung Zangbo River on the right.

We had no choice but to walk 36 kilometers along the Yarlung Zangbo River, investigate in Beibeng Township for a few days, and walk another 36 kilometers back. When we drove back, we only drove 20 kilometers of the 130-kilometer road. As a result, it rained heavily and washed away the newly repaired road. We walked the rest of the way for another three days. From an altitude of 1,000 meters, we walked to the Snow Mountain Pass at 4,300 meters, and then went down the mountain to an altitude of 3,000 meters. On the way, we encountered the simple accommodation where the road construction team lived, so we stayed there for one night.

It was already early September, and the mountain was about to be closed due to heavy snow. After the mountain was closed due to heavy snow, the county town was cut off from the outside world. The driver couldn’t get out of the car at that time. They said, “If the emergency repairs are not successful, we will have to spend the winter inside, and we can’t get out until the snow melts in May of the following year.” Fortunately, the road was repaired only three days later, and the driver drove over the mountain and picked us up at the foot of the mountain on the other side.

Of course, the roads are now well built, and a tunnel has been dug inside the Galung La Mountain, which is accessible even in winter.

Emphasize discipline again and again, and don't dare to make any mistakes

Wang Genxu (Researcher at Chengdu Mountain Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences)

In 2019, Wang Genxu's team measured the distribution of water on the ice layer on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. Image courtesy of Wang Genxu

In the wild, I mainly conducted surveys and experiments in the source areas of the Yellow River and the Yangtze River, all at an altitude of more than 3,000 meters. But I didn't have any particularly dangerous experiences, and my experience was very ordinary.

In the past, some teams doing glacier research had people accidentally fall into ice holes or into rivers, but our team never encountered such a problem. This may be because I was lucky, but we were also very careful.

When we are in the wild, we usually don't go to some places alone. When crossing the glacier, my principle is that there must be a team of people, at least three or four people. Be especially careful in places with ice cracks and tie each other with safety ropes. Crossing the river is also very dangerous. There are floods in summer, and in principle, wading through the river is not allowed, because the floods in the mountains can be very deep and fast. We have not encountered large beasts, at most we have encountered some wolves, foxes and the like. Because there are so many of us, they hide from us as soon as they see us, and they are still afraid of people when there are so many people.

I will not let students do anything too dangerous. Every time I go on a field trip, I always emphasize discipline to everyone. One thing that needs to be paid special attention to in the field is that any individualism is absolutely not allowed.

For example, if he/she finishes his/her work first and leaves first, or goes down the mountain to the car, it is not allowed. Everyone must start work at the same time and finish work at the same time. After going out, we must not dare to make any mistakes, even if it is just an injury, we should try our best to avoid it.

Comprehensive sources: Xinhua News Agency, CCTV News, Beijing News, Workers' Daily, China Science Daily, Jimu News, Red Star News, @China Fire, Metropolitan Times, etc.