Last month, I supported a search for a solo hiker missing for six days above the snowline in Skagit County, Washington. As the mountain rescue teams started working their way up into their assigned areas, I loaded into the Spokane Sheriff’s helicopter, along with the...
Most hikers don’t realize it, but when they head out on the trail or into the wilderness, they carry with them a Risk Profile. In 2018, a novice snowshoer perished after getting lost while descending the Muir Snowfield on Mount Rainier. On the second day of the...
Sometimes we give up. Sometimes on SAR missions we return day after day, then week after week, without finding our lost person. The search is called off. Volunteers leave the scene in quiet resignation. Families leave the scene in despair. In the last six months here...
In November of 2020, a solo snow-shoer became lost while descending the Muir Snowfield on Mount Rainier. In the dark, ranger search teams climbed up in a snow storm, but were unable to locate him. The next morning, more search teams arrived, and in mid-afternoon the...
There has been a recent surge in the long-term discussion about the use of the word “closure” in SAR-related writings. Some point out (rightly so) that families of the lost may never fully recover from their grief and pain, and some conclude (wrongly, in my opinion),...
