Article: A puzzling increase in BWCA emergencies; Officials there handled almost double the evacuations and calls for search-and-rescue missions this year as in each of the past three years.(NEWS)

Byline: Larry Oakes; Staff Writer

Duluth, Minn. -- A spike in emergency evacuations from the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in 2005 has U.S. Forest Service officials scratching their heads about why.

This year, officials evacuated 21 people for medical reasons and they were called out on 12 search-and-rescue operations, according to figures compiled by the Superior National Forest, which oversees the wilderness area.

Those 33 emergency incidents are almost twice as many as the 17 recorded in 2004, the 19 incidents in 2003 and the 17 incidents in 2002 - the first year the statistics were kept in their present form.

"We haven't ...

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