Calabasas teen finds unconscious hiker

RESCUED—Paramedics prepare to move an unconscious man who apparently fell while walking alone in Wildwood Canyon. A Calabasas teen, hiking with his father, noticed the man wedged between some rocks and called for help. Calabasas resident Alex Mittelman, 19, was hiking with his father on the evening of Sept. 24 near Paradise Falls in Wildwood Canyon of Thousand Oaks when he spotted someone stuck between some rocks. When Alex went in for a closer look, he found the person was unconscious.

Dressed in hiking clothes, with banged-up knees and other apparent injuries, and wedged between some rocks, the man appeared to have fallen, according to Alan Mittelman, Alex’s father. The sun was sinking and Alex and his father had to get help quick before darkness fell. Alex tried to free the unconscious hiker but couldn’t move him at all.

“Alex stayed with him while I tried to call for help on my cellphone,” Mittelman said. “As I went up a hill, I found another hiker (Bob Oettinger of Westlake Village) and I asked him, ‘I can’t get any reception, can you try and call 911 for me?’ He was able to get through to 911 for me. His service had reception. . . .You think you’re safe because you have a cellphone with you, but you realize how fragile that is. No matter where I ran to—I was running up the hill, wearing myself out—I could not get a signal.”

Alex and his dad have been hiking together about twice a month for many years. They’d never come across an emergency situation before. But Alex has trained for such circumstances and his instincts kept him calm, he said.

“Alex has taken survival classes,” Mittelman said. “He took that through (the YMCA’s) Indian Guides, and he took a private Earth Skills training course, too.” More recently, Alex had taken an herbology class on the importance of herbs to the human body. “The next thing I think he’ll do will probably be first aid skills,” Mittelman said.

“(My interest in nature) 14started in Indian Guides when I’d go camping,” Alex said. “I used to see wild animals and that kind of got me interested. But what really did it, I think, was when I was about 11 years old, I went to a place called ‘outdoor education’ and you had to survive in nature for five days. You’re trained on what to eat and what to do.”

In addition to Alex’s interest in nature and survival in nature, Alex loves reading and loves writing, he said.

“He’s read a lot of books by Tom Brown, who’s a survivalist and hiking expert,” Mittelman said.

Alex is currently taking a creative writing class and enjoys writing about nature. He wrote the following brief recommendation to hikers:

“Always tell someone, preferably someone you know well, where you’re going hiking and how long you’ll be gone so that if you’re lost, the authorities will be immediately notified.”

“That’s something this guy didn’t do,” Mittelman said of the fallen hiker. “Absolutely no one was around. This guy was all on his own. . . .That’s when it can get dangerous.”

Within 10 minutes after Mittelman called 911, Ventura County emergency officials arrived on the scene. Authorities couldn’t figure out how the hiker got trapped, according to Mittelman, who assumes the man fell, but he doesn’t know from what elevation.

Mittelman and Alex don’t know how the fallen hiker is doing because of privacy laws. They have no way of getting in touch with him and they didn’t get his name.

“Maybe he’ll see this article and then know who it was who saved him,” Mittelman said. “He doesn’t know. He was unconscious. . . . I yelled in his ear several times, ‘Are you with us? Can you hear me?’ Nothing.”

The fallen hiker became conscious only briefly when the emergency response helicopter was touching down and blowing dirt and debris into his eyes, according to Mittelman. The hiker was airlifted to Los Robles Hospital.

Glenn Kiney, supervisor of the Park Rangers of Conejo Valley, said the hiker was very lucky Alex found him when he did, given the location and the fact that it was getting dark and cold. Mittelman is proud of his son for how he handled the situation.