At 0023 on the morning of Sunday, January 29th, the brigade SAR team leader sent out a request for team members to participate in the second operational period of a mission in the Arroyo Hondo area, reporting to incident base at 0900. A 75 year old male had been reported missing. With nighttime temperatures well below freezing this could well be a life-threatening, severe hypothermia situation. Three experienced members of the brigade responded, in addition to the incident commander for the period being a brigade member.
Upon arrival at incident base it turned out that the situation was different than expected. The subject, who lived alone, was last seen the previous Sunday and the day prior a concerned neighbor had called NMSP for a welfare check on the subject. When responding officers arrived they found that the subject’s vehicles were still present and his personal effects still in the house. Since the subject was known to regularly walk the trails and forest service roads in the area a hasty search by Taos SAR was initiated. By this time it was late Saturday evening and the decision was made to perform a full search during the second operational period the next day in daylight.
In addition to the brigade, responding ground teams included Santa Fe SAR, Taos SAR, and Atalaya SAR. Canine teams from Taos and PK9 also responded. A sortie by the NMSP helicopter, Able 7, was also performed. One of the brigade members provided support to a dog handler from PK9 while the other two members were teamed with five members of Santa Fe SAR. This large team of seven was tasked with clearing trails and forest service roads in the northern sector of the search area. The size of the team allowed it to split in to smaller teams when obviously used intersections were reached. Over the course of the day the team split and rejoined several times.
By the middle of the afternoon the incident commander felt that the area where the subject might have walked and then fallen or taken a wrong turn was well covered and the search was suspended.
At this time the fate of the subject is still unknown. Our thoughts and prayers are with the subject and his family.