The Brigade was called out on the evening of May 13th for a missing hiker at a trailhead near our home base in Los Alamos. Eight Brigade members responded, including one who served as Incident Commander for this mission and another who helped run incident base throughout the mission.
Team 1, a hasty team of three Brigaders, was sent out to check coordinates obtained from the subject’s cell phone. On their way, they encountered a small family of black bears and had to navigate through dense deadfall and steep terrain. They made it to the subject shortly after local firefighters and police who found the subject at the expected location, over half a mile from the nearest trail.
As night fell and scattered showers set in, Team 2, consisting of three Brigade members, set out to haul additional supplies and equipment into the field and provide support for Team 1. By midnight, Team 2 had joined Team 1 and the subject, who were walking out through the maze of deadfall and new-growth aspen trees. A chainsaw hauled in by Team 2 was used to cut a path through the downfall and significantly helped with getting our subject out.
The combined team slowly cleared a path and made their way back to the main trail, with additional support from Atalaya SAR. From there, everyone was able to ride back to incident base, thanks to Rio Arriba County’s UTV team. Shortly after 3am everyone including the subject was back at the trailhead and heading home.