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> it's best to lock up the vehicle with a note on the dash and make your way to a shelter out of harms way Just a note for varying geographical locations: If y

> it's best to lock up the vehicle with a note on the dash and make your way to a shelter out of harms way Just a note for varying geographical locations: If you do this in Australia, you will most likely die from exposure.

lazyasciiart 5y ago
Just a note for locations actually not varying that much and this is generally terrible advice: people die of exposure doing this in the US and everyone ever asked from search and rescue will tell you to stay in your car unless it is actively going underwater or falling off a cliff.
- pengaru 5y ago
  It's qualified with unless you're genuinely isolated and there's no reasonably accessible shelter away from traffic. i.e. If you're stuck on the shoulder of a snowy/icy highway and there's a walking distance Motel 6 visible, go straight to the hotel and make your phone calls there. A road is a terrible place to camp, your occupancy has zero influence on the probability of the vehicle getting hit, though it may feel like the right/responsible thing to do - to not abandon your vehicle, it's rarely the safe choice when the stop was unplanned.
  - _muff1nman_ 5y ago
    This is still really bad advice. There was a recent instance not a year ago where folks were stuck with 3 feet of snow at night on an interstate interchange. Yes there was a hotel not a mile from where they were but getting out of your car to cross the interstate in 3 feet of snow is a great way to get hit or get lost in the blizzard and get some good hypothermia. Compare this to staying in their car where they were picked up by highway patrol in a snow cat a few hours later and taken to a shelter. And its not some stroke of luck either, highway patrol knows to go look for people in their cars with the snow cat and do it nearly every year. They do not know to look for you in a drift of snow over the side of the highway.
    - pengaru 5y ago
      For every anecdote you can provide of someone being careless on foot I can find multiple instances of a stopped vehicle being smashed into on a highway. Now we even have the pleasure of anticipating Tesla Autopilot to plow into us while stopped on the shoulder, apparently made even more likely if there's an emergency vehicle present.
      - _muff1nman_ 5y ago
        I didn't disagree that sometimes it makes sense to get out of your vehicle if the road is all iced up and one is worried about a trucker crushing into you due to fog. Rather I'm more refuting the following statement: > unless you're truly in no mans land without any reachable alternatives for shelter, it's best to lock up the vehicle with a note on the dash and make your way to a shelter out of harms way The presence of anecdotes that conflict each other is evidence that it is hard to make blanket statements like the above although I would still argue that the default should be stay in or near your vehicle during winter weather related emergencies. Also any anecdotes about AI related disasters are off topic ;)
        onecommentman 5y ago
        If there is this much confusion in a online community like this about what to do in such situations, either a more thorough study needs to be done by the Feds or a better job communicating what definitive study results recommend, with easy rules of thumb like “if you can see the lights of a shelter on the road from your vehicle and you haven’t seen a vehicle on the road in the last hour, then walk to the shelter’.
        msrenee 5y ago
        Where I'm at in the Midwest, that light could be miles away. It's really not possible to make a one-size-fits-all recommendation. For what it's worth, every time I've seen first responders talk about adverse weather conditions, they say to stay with the vehicle if possible. Obviously if you're on the interstate outside of Los Angeles, you probably want to get the heck off the roadway no matter what. But if you're lost or trapped, a vehicle is much easier to spot than a pedestrian. If you're lucky enough that there's helicopters looking for you, being near the vehicle is going to drastically reduce the time it takes to find you.

lazyasciiart 5y ago

Just a note for locations actually not varying that much and this is generally terrible advice: people die of exposure doing this in the US and everyone ever asked from search and rescue will tell you to stay in your car unless it is actively going underwater or falling off a cliff.

pengaru 5y ago
It's qualified with unless you're genuinely isolated and there's no reasonably accessible shelter away from traffic. i.e. If you're stuck on the shoulder of a snowy/icy highway and there's a walking distance Motel 6 visible, go straight to the hotel and make your phone calls there. A road is a terrible place to camp, your occupancy has zero influence on the probability of the vehicle getting hit, though it may feel like the right/responsible thing to do - to not abandon your vehicle, it's rarely the safe choice when the stop was unplanned.
- _muff1nman_ 5y ago
  This is still really bad advice. There was a recent instance not a year ago where folks were stuck with 3 feet of snow at night on an interstate interchange. Yes there was a hotel not a mile from where they were but getting out of your car to cross the interstate in 3 feet of snow is a great way to get hit or get lost in the blizzard and get some good hypothermia. Compare this to staying in their car where they were picked up by highway patrol in a snow cat a few hours later and taken to a shelter. And its not some stroke of luck either, highway patrol knows to go look for people in their cars with the snow cat and do it nearly every year. They do not know to look for you in a drift of snow over the side of the highway.
  - pengaru 5y ago
    For every anecdote you can provide of someone being careless on foot I can find multiple instances of a stopped vehicle being smashed into on a highway. Now we even have the pleasure of anticipating Tesla Autopilot to plow into us while stopped on the shoulder, apparently made even more likely if there's an emergency vehicle present.
    - _muff1nman_ 5y ago
      I didn't disagree that sometimes it makes sense to get out of your vehicle if the road is all iced up and one is worried about a trucker crushing into you due to fog. Rather I'm more refuting the following statement: > unless you're truly in no mans land without any reachable alternatives for shelter, it's best to lock up the vehicle with a note on the dash and make your way to a shelter out of harms way The presence of anecdotes that conflict each other is evidence that it is hard to make blanket statements like the above although I would still argue that the default should be stay in or near your vehicle during winter weather related emergencies. Also any anecdotes about AI related disasters are off topic ;)
      - onecommentman 5y ago
        If there is this much confusion in a online community like this about what to do in such situations, either a more thorough study needs to be done by the Feds or a better job communicating what definitive study results recommend, with easy rules of thumb like “if you can see the lights of a shelter on the road from your vehicle and you haven’t seen a vehicle on the road in the last hour, then walk to the shelter’.
        msrenee 5y ago
        Where I'm at in the Midwest, that light could be miles away. It's really not possible to make a one-size-fits-all recommendation. For what it's worth, every time I've seen first responders talk about adverse weather conditions, they say to stay with the vehicle if possible. Obviously if you're on the interstate outside of Los Angeles, you probably want to get the heck off the roadway no matter what. But if you're lost or trapped, a vehicle is much easier to spot than a pedestrian. If you're lucky enough that there's helicopters looking for you, being near the vehicle is going to drastically reduce the time it takes to find you.