Hiker rescued from California mountains after possible spider bite left her unable to feel legs
A woman was rescued last week after a possible spider bite left her unable to feel the skin on her legs during a hike in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains.
The hiker made a call for help around 6:30 p.m. on June 12 as she was on Taboose Pass Trail, the Inyo County Search and Rescue said on Facebook.
She was a little less than two miles shy of the trailhead when she went to get some water from a creek and “reportedly got bitten by what she thought was a spider.”
A hiker is rescued from Taboose Pass Trail in the Sierra Nevada on June 12, 2024.Inyo County Search and Rescue
Afterwards, she was “unable to feel the skin on her legs and could not continue her hike down,” Inyo County Search and Rescue said in a statement.
Luckily the woman, whose name was not released, was able to share her coordinates before her phone battery died.
Inyo Search and Rescue assembled a team and drove the “rough road” up to Taboose trailhead. Rescuers also pushed a wheeled carrier for about a mile and a half on the trail until it became “too rough,” the group said.
When rescuers found the hiker, they helped slowly walk her down a “the tricky section of the trail” and later transferred her into the wheeled carrier.
The hiker and rescue team arrived at the trailhead just before midnight.
Inyo Search and Rescue warned hikers to bring power banks for their phones when heading out, and reminded the public that the Taboose, Sawmill, Baxter, and Shepherd Pass Trails are “a lot less maintained" than the rest of the trails in the Sierra and hikers may encounter “very tricky sections” and “very steep grades.”
Marlene Lenthang
Breaking News Reporter