[at-l] AT Hiker Shot By Hunter

[Brett Tucker" <blisterfree@earthlink.net (Brett Tucker)]

> Nov. 24, 2002 -- A 16-year-old metro Atlanta girl is in critical condition
> after she was shot by a hunter this morning in the North Georgia
mountains.
> Rachel Ferguson, a student at Bartow County High School, was hiking on the
> Appalachian Trail about 7 a.m. when she was hit once in the abdomen, her
> father said.

Sunrise time in north Georgia is currently around 7:10 am. Not that this
necessarily means anything, given some of the possible clues already
contained in the news story. I'm somewhat surprised to see the victim's name
in print, given her age and the as-yet undetermined motive for firing the
gun.

Tales like this hit home. The AT is a quiet dream for hikers during autumn,
until one day rounding a bend and suddenly walking into the sheer, dumb
physics of guns, target visibility, and vagrancies in judgement. There is
also a well-scored line in the dirt separating the bow hunter and his fair
and lonely season from the violent hairtrigger dominion of the rifleman.
Southbounders, be fleet-footed.

- blisterfree