A California man who was stranded for three days at the base of a waterfall after falling 1,000 feet from a Hawaiian hiking trail said on Tuesday that his survival was nothing short of a "miracle."
Ian Snyder, a 34-year-old travel blogger, thanked rescuers for finding him last week and ending his harrowing ordeal below Oahu's Koolau Summit Trail.
"It's a miracle, first and foremost, of God," Snyder told reporters and rescuers in Honolulu. "I couldn't believe it when people were telling me, 'You fell 1,000 feet down a cliff' and I'm like, 'How did I even survive?'"
Snyder fell and was reported missing on Dec. 4, officials said, before he was found on Thursday.
After Snyder was reported missing, rescuers and local hikers used the man's own social media postings and geolocation data to determine his approximate location.
As rescuers were frantically searching, Snyder said he was calm throughout those days, accepting that he might not make it out alive.
“I had made my peace and said, 'If this is my time, I’m ready to go,'” Snyder said. “But if it’s not my time, I know that that patch of sky in front of me, that I’ll be able to wave at a helicopter. I had made my peace with God. I will be OK whether I live or whether I die.”
Snyder's wounds were still fresh and clearly visible on Tuesday, sporting a black eye, numerous cuts on his head, his broken left arm in a sling and using a cane to walk.
“We were amazed," Honolulu Fire Department Capt. Adrian Cravalho said. "To be 1,000 feet down from the trail and to have survived — as we've said many times — is a miracle."
"We are still baffled by it," Cravalho said.
Local hiker and volunteer searcher Amber Fonte was overjoyed to see Snyder hobbling but very much alive on Tuesday. She admitted to having low expectations during the dayslong search.
“I thought the best gift we could give to the family was that we had found a body," Fonte said. "And when we found a whole human living and breathing and waving at the sky, I was like, 'Merry Christmas.'"
After the fall, Snyder said he dragged his body to be as close to water as possible so he could drink from a stream with his right hand.
"I made sure I had a spot where I could get the water as I needed with my right hand and I just kind of hunkered down from there and time passed," he said.
Looking back, Snyder said he wasn't as prepared as he should have been for this hike and shouldn't have gone it alone.
"I don't know when I toppled. I know I looked down at Pali Highway (Hawaii Route 61) and went, 'Man, that's a long way below me,'" he said. "I need to be more wise with how to plan my hikes. I look back and, like, this is a bit foolhardy to do by myself, knowing everything I know now, and people, don't hike alone out here."
