Getting trapped in quicksand is a corny peril of old movies and TV shows, but it really did happen to one unfortunate hiker in Utah’s Arches National Park.
The park famous for dozens of natural, sandstone arches gets over 1 million visitors a year, and accidents ranging from falls to heat stroke are common.
Quicksand? Not really – but it has happened at least a couple of times now.
“The wet sand just kind of flows back in. It’s kind of a never-ending battle,” said John Marshall, who helped a woman stuck in quicksand over a decade ago and coordinated the latest rescue.
On Sunday, an experienced hiker was traversing a small canyon on the second day of a 20-mile backpacking trip when he sank up to his thigh, according to Marshall.
Unable to free himself, the hiker activated an emergency satellite beacon. His message got forwarded to Grand County emergency responders and Marshall got the call at 7:15 a.m..
“I was just rolling out of bed,” Marshall said. “I’m scratching my head, going, ‘Did I hear that right? Did they say quicksand?'”
The hiker wasn’t publicly named but Fox13 spoke to him and identified him as Austin Dirks.
“Before this trip, I honestly thought quicksand was more of a folklore or a legend,” Dirks told the outlet.
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He put his boots on and rendezvoused with a team that set out with all-terrain vehicles, a ladder, traction boards, backboards and a drone. Soon, Marshall had a bird’s-eye view of the situation.
Through the drone camera he saw a park ranger who’d tossed the man a shovel. But the quicksand flowed back as soon as the backpacker shoveled it away, Marshall said.
The Grand County Search and Rescue team positioned the ladder and boards near the backpacker and slowly worked his leg loose. By then he’d been standing in near-freezing muck, in temperatures in the 20s, for a couple of hours.
Rescuers warmed him up until he could stand, then walk. He then hiked out on his own, even carrying his backpack, Marshall said.
“How it’s depicted on TV is nothing like it is in real life,” the hiker, Dirks, told Fox13. “The human body is more buoyant than the quicksand, so you’ll never sink to above your head.”
Quicksand is dangerous but it’s a myth total submersion is the main risk, said Marshall.
“In quicksand you’re extremely buoyant,” he said. “Most people won’t sink past their waist in quicksand.”
Marshall is more or less a quicksand expert.
In 2014, he was a medic who helped a 78-year-old woman after she was stuck for over 13 hours in the same canyon just 2 mile from where Sunday’s rescue took place.
The woman’s book club got worried when she missed their meeting. They went looking for her and found her car at a trailhead. It was June – warmer than Sunday but not sweltering in the canyon’s shade – and the woman made a full recovery after regaining use of her legs.
“Both had very happy endings,” Marshall said.
The Grand County Search and Rescue team has had a busy year. According to a Facebook post earlier this month, the team has responded to 140 calls so far in 2025, accounting for about 2,900 rescue hours. Among the calls: A stranded canyoneer who got her hair tangled in a rappel device and a couple trapped in their Jeep, caught on a flooded road.
