Thunder hit hikers

[Kim]

Originally Posted by andarchen

Here is weather change example at Miyun district of Beijing (40.260784°N 117.331631°E around)on same day tragedy happened at Huairou district .

Any idea of the time difference between the first and last photo?

[Bryan]

Originally Posted by andarchen

Here is weather change example at Miyun district of Beijing (40.260784°N 117.331631°E around)on same day tragedy happened at Huairou district .

Yikes! That is some scary looking weather. Good to see the photographer went down to the road!

[andarchen]

Originally Posted by Kim

Any idea of the time difference between the first and last photo?

First two photos might be taken around pm 2 , and others were being taken on his way home .more photos can be seen at link:
http://www.thegreatwall.com.cn/phpbb...8725&forumid=1

[andarchen]

Thunder at a glance .

[Bryan]

Originally Posted by andarchen

Thunder at a glance .

Nice photo. I'm guessing it's from Gubeikou.

[andarchen]

Originally Posted by greatwallforum

Nice photo. I'm guessing it's from Gubeikou.

I had replyed your guess on that photo posting , hope his response.

[andarchen]

The photographer was so impressed your talent on GW,
here is his posting and replies:
http://www.thegreatwall.com.cn/phpbb...8842&forumid=3

[PWCCA]

Originally Posted by Kim

Yes, it seems a bit unclear. But the lesson to be learned is never to go up there when the forecast predicts thunder or turn back if you see a thunderstorm approaching!

But is there any advice if you do find yourself caught up there and a storm approaches (and cannot turn back, I know how unpredictable the weather in Beijing can be at times). Would you be safer heading to the nearest tower or will that be just as unsafe?

Also... because of this tragedy, do you think there will be tighter security on all access points leading to that section of the wall? I know the Chinese government does have a tendency to over-react to such things (the incident in the Drum Tower was a prime example).

[Bryan]

Originally Posted by PWCCA

But is there any advice if you do find yourself caught up there and a storm approaches (and cannot turn back, I know how unpredictable the weather in Beijing can be at times). Would you be safer heading to the nearest tower or will that be just as unsafe?

Also... because of this tragedy, do you think there will be tighter security on all access points leading to that section of the wall? I know the Chinese government does have a tendency to over-react to such things (the incident in the Drum Tower was a prime example).

I do not think a Great Wall tower would provide any protection and may actually be more dangerous due to being the tallest thing around. There really is no safe place to be outside in a thunderstorm. You must try to get low down and preferably indoors when a storm is approaching. It's better to avoid the situation entirely by not going out in potentially stormy weather.

Try doing some Web research and you will find articles like this one:

http://www.acacamps.org/profmembers/...06w_safety.php

In my opinion, the over-reactions have been when foreigners are involved in accidents and I hope no changes are made in the Jiankou area as a result of this accident.

[Kim]

But is there any advice if you do find yourself caught up there and a storm approaches (and cannot turn back, I know how unpredictable the weather in Beijing can be at times). Would you be safer heading to the nearest tower or will that be just as unsafe?

I my experience the weather forecasts are normally very accurate - at least for Tangshan, so I guess they should be for Beijing as well. I use two plug-ins for Mozilla Firefox - ForecastFox and 1-ClickWeather. The two combined rarely miss.

Regarding multiple days hike in Beijing/Hebei. Don't plan that in June-August.

Also... because of this tragedy, do you think there will be tighter security on all access points leading to that section of the wall?

Probably not.