This article is about the 3 hikers in the Smokeys a few weeks ago. Well, maybe I shouldn't be calling them hikers...

I'm new at long distance hiking in winter weather and even I have heard the saying "Cotton Kills." Why would anyone be carrying canned food though? I have never met a hiker anywhere that carries cans because of the weight and the absurd amount of waste to pack out. Then again they would probably just throw their cans into the fire and think "It will melt away." Hate when people do that.

It wasn't too long ago people wore cotton. .. They might have saved a 911 call if they all had a 0* sleeping bags and a shelter.

I made the cotton mistake last year when I set out on the A.T., but it was not by choice it is because it was all that I had. I got caught on top of Blood Mountain in a freezing rain storm and ignorantly kept going. I was wearing cotton long johns, denim jeans, a cotton t shirt, a cotton hoodie, a Free-Tech synthetic jacket, and threw and emergency poncho over me to try and keep the freezing rain off of me. I made it to the shelter and my ignorance proceeded to outdo me one more time. I should have waited it out in the shelter, but no, my inner idiot said to keep going. I slipped, slid, and fell at least 50 times trying to get over the iced up rock on top of Blood. But wait, the story does not end there, I dropped my cell phone at the shelter since I did not ensure that it's dry box was properly secured and the dry box was hanging on the back of my pack so I slipped, slid, and fell 50 more times going back to the shelter to get it. By this time you would think that I would have stayed at the shelter and waited it out, right? Nope, not this stupidly stubborn village idiot. I did the whole song and dance for a third time and made it down to Mountain Crossings through a dense fog that limited visibility to 10 feet in front of your face, max. Needless to say, I learned to respect the weather that day and will never pull a stunt like that again and when I left Mountain Crossings I left my cotton in the garbage can.

Yes, different clothing would have been nice but it wouldn't have changed the amount of times you fell or having to back track. ... The best thing to do is just be prepared for all conditions. But that doesn't mean carrying all kinds of weight. Sometimes it means stopping, pitching shelter, and getting wet clothes off and get warm. Tomorrow is a new day.

You are so right about that DMAX, that was the biggest lesson that I learned out of the whole deal and one that will forever be imprinted into my mind. my ignorance put me at serious risk and when you couple that with stubbornness the culmination brews up the perfect recipe for disaster.

All my early (70s) hikes on the AT were in cotton and carrying canned food - pork and beans, Dinty Moore beef stew, Campbells soup,etc. and carrying a Coleman 2 burner stove.