Out of an abundance of caution
Hikers who refuse to provide a planned advance itinerary during times of decreased park use or increased adverse weather conditions and insist on traveling without a companion, are officially banned from national park entry. The expense of searching for missing/injured hikers is too great to justify the extremely low odds of finding them alive 24-48 hours beyond a reasonable return time.
If the government can shut down an particular model of transportation based on the inexplicable loss of 189 + 157 individuals in a 12-month span, it sure as hell should do the same when, on average, 160 individuals routinely go missing in U.S. national parks year after year after year.
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