Visitor perceptions of technology and rescue in the wilderness

As devices like personal locator beacons become readily available, more visitors will bring them into wilderness and use them to request rescues. Visitors may develop unrealistic expectations of rescue based on these devices, and come to rely on them instead of developing appropriate knowledge and skills. In 2009, 235 overnight visitors to the King Range Wilderness in California completed a written survey. Visitors with previous involvement in a serious wilderness accident were more likely to believe that technology creates a false sense of safety for wilderness users than were people who had not been involved in a serious wilderness accident. Experienced visitors were likewise more likely to believe that technology makes visitors feel that they have a safety net which in reality may not exist. Experience as also positively correlated with the belief that technology makes people feel that their safety is not their personal responsibility.