On February 17, pagers go off, phone calls go out and 12 people gather at the main ski patrol office at Mammoth Mountain. An overdue snowboarder, they are told, last had his ticket scanned at 10 a.m. at the Main Gondola, when the weather finally allowed access to the top of the mountain. He never showed up at his motel to check out, three days later.
But it is now Saturday, February 17, over 72 hours have passed since he went missing, not good odds for being found.
But odds, good or bad, is not what sets the Mono County Search and Rescue team into motion. It is people, those who need help, in one way or another. They begin by gathering information, work with a history and profile of the lost person, then adding in weather and terrain they come up with a workable plan. Whether it's the backside of the mountain, Red's Meadow, or Minaret Summit, they constantly re-evaluate the area of probability, where the victim would most likely be found. As tired teams come in to rest, new teams get ready to go out, some arriving from China Lake and Inyo County in mutual aid. They work through the day, the night, and into the next day. On Sunday, dog teams and field teams work through rime ice forming on their radios, in white-out conditions. Each team adds up their probability of detecting the victim in their area. And as each area searched is plotted on the base operations map, new plans are organized.
For the SAR team, the weather finally has the last word. On Sunday, new teams arrive ready for assignment, more dog teams are on the way, but it is a difficult decision for the operations leader to say no, the weather provides too high a safety risk, we have to wait. When the safety of team members is put in jeopardy on any search, the decision is clear, the search is suspended.
When the snow finally stops falling on February 22, over four feet of soft, swimmable powder has accumulated on top of several feet of slick ice, a skier's paradise perhaps, but the avalanche danger is extremely high for the next 24 to 48 hours. When the weather finally clears on February 23, and the Fallon Naval Air Station helicopter crew flies the backside of the mountain low to the terrain, looking for any signs of life, tracks, a shelter, someone emerging from a safe spot after a wicked storm. They fly the mountain until incoming weather turns them around.
In the days following, some 20 members of the SAR team continue to ski, snowshoe and board the backside of the mountain, still the highest area for probable detection, from Dragon's Back, to Hole in the Wall, from Visalia Bowl to Fresno Bowl to Hemlock Ridge. Bob Sollima in Red's Meadow tracks the movement of bear and coyote and alone skis up areas between Mammoth Pass and Turkey Gulch. A fifth dog team from WOOF grids miles of Visalia Bowl and below. As the snow melts, areas of high probability are skied again by individual team members, and researched as the snow goes lower, team members finally opt for hiking boots.
On Saturday, May 26, two members of the SAR team decide to hike the front side of the mountain, where most of the snow had finally given way. A highly improbable circumstance, but not impossible. They knew exactly what they were looking for when they spot the bottom of a K2 snowboard, the kind George Hoyt was reported to have been riding the day he disappeared, February 14. Nestled at the base of a steep drop of rocks near Chair 9, he was still surrounded by nearly 10 feet of snow. The search had officially ended.
Over the three and a half months since the original search had been suspended, over 70 individual search "assignments" had been added to the original search log by members of Mono County SAR team. Several team members skied nearly 20 individual days apiece. Search Dog Teams continued to respond. Bob Sollima, in Red's Meadow alone, logged nearly 30 days of searching. In Mono County, a search that has been suspended does not mean the search is over.
The anatomy of a search often changes over hours, days and, as has happened recently in Mono County, over months. The essence of a search always remains the same; first keep yourself safe, then your team members, do all in the best interest of the victim. Closure is a very important part of the anatomy of any search, not only for the operations leaders and field team members, but most importantly, for the family. We are responsible to them all. MT