Foot Found in Yellowstone Hot Pool ID'd as that of LA Man

[mahatmakanejeeves]

MONTANA

Foot Found in Yellowstone Hot Pool ID’d as that of LA Man

It still isn't clear how the man, Il Hun Ro, ended up in the spring, but investigators don't suspect foul play

BY ASSOCIATED PRESS
NOVEMBER 17, 2022

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK, Wyo. – A foot found floating in a Yellowstone National Park hot pool last summer belonged to a 70-year-old man from Los Angeles, park officials said Thursday.

It still isn’t clear how the man, Il Hun Ro, ended up in the spring, but investigators don’t suspect foul play, park officials said in a statement.

Park staff found Ro’s partial foot inside of a shoe in Abyss Pool in the park’s West Thumb Geyser Basin in August.

Investigators concluded that whatever happened to Ro occurred on the morning of July 31, but that nobody saw it. They identified Ro through a DNA analysis and notified his family, officials said.

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[eppur_se_muova]

1. DO NOT get off the railed walkways.

They put up the rails decades ago after a visitor was blinded by a cloud of steam and stepped off the walkway into a fatally hot pool. Still people do occasionally fall in accidentally. Taking the trails alone NOT a good idea.

Sort of makes me wonder if he was really alone.

[Tomconroy]

2. Kevin Costner knows something about this.

[Xoan]

3. More likely ...

Rip and the midnight train.

[ColinC]

4. I like how cops will find a random severed foot and still conclude

“No foul play”

[3Hotdogs]

5. Months of being in boiling water..

Water pressure could separate body parts

[ColinC]

6. Fair enough

[2naSalit]

7. You know...

You could be standing right there, in uniform wearing a badge, and tell someone to avoid a danger but a determined asshole will look you right in the eye and do it anyway, right there in front of you.

When somebody decides to take a bath in a boiling hot spring and nobody is there to see it...

[cksmithy]

8. This reminds me of a terrible incident

at Yosemite National Park about 10 years ago. On the mist trail, climbing up stairs on the rock face, cables to hold on to, you arrive at the top of Vernal Falls. It is beautiful, look over the edge, breath taking views. There are signs all over the place that say something to the effect, if you go into the river, even if the water is shallow, you will be swept over the edge, because the granite rock is very slippery and you will die. Do not go in the water. The signs were in multiple languages, with pictures that tell/show you not to go in the water, show what will happen it you do.

Well, a few weeks after we hiked up to the falls, a church group from Modesto, on a day trip, didn't take the signs seriously or bother to read them. People were screaming at them to get out of the water (I'm sure they had ptsd for a while from this). The people in the water just laughed and waved at the terrified people one the river edge not understanding the danger they were in. They didn't understand or believe the signs, and they went over the falls. I think 3 people went over the falls. It took days to find all of the bodies.

I've been to Yellowstone more than once, there are signs there too. Sometimes people just thinks the rules are for other people, not themselves. Going to National Parks is going into wilderness areas not Disneyland type parks.

I'm glad they were able to identify his remains for his family.