Soon after summitting the tallest peak in Yellowstone National Park last week, a 22-year-old concessionaire worker went missing.
Authorities had more than 20 ground searchers, two helicopters, drones and a search dog team scouring the area of Eagle Peak in the park’s remote southeast corner on Sunday in the hopes of finding Austin King, who was last seen Sept. 17.
Yellowstone National Park also dispatched a statement asking for the public to help in any way it can.
King stands 6 feet tall, weighs 160 pounds, has brown hair, hazel eyes, wears glasses and was last seen in a black sweatshirt and grey pants, says the statement.
He based his camp near the upper Howell Creek area, then on Tuesday summitted Eagle Peak and called friends and family.
From atop the 11,361-foot mountain, King described fog, rain, sleet, hail and wind to his loved ones.
King was due to board a boat Friday afternoon after a planned seven-day backcountry trek, but he missed his boat pickup, a caller told the Yellowstone Interagency Communications Center.
Search and rescue teams deployed at first light Saturday morning, brining aerial reconnaissance and ground searches in the high mountain areas and the surrounding regions, including Yellowstone Lake, says the statement.
Rescuers found King’s camp and personal things Saturday evening in the upper Howell Creek area.
Authorities encourage anyone with information about King’s whereabouts to contact the park’s dispatch center at 307-344-2643.
‘Good Hands’
Mark Marschall, who served as a National Park Service ranger in Yellowstone from 1973 to 2001 and wrote the book “Yellowstone Trails: A Hiking Guide,” said he was impressed with the park’s call for public help.
He’s also been impressed with the search and rescue teams in the past, and believes them to be of the highest caliber, he said.
In that respect, King is in “good hands,” Marschall told Cowboy State Daily in a Monday interview.
“I hope they find him,” said Marschall. “I know his family has got to be really nervous and doesn’t know what to expect; (and) I just wish the best for the searchers, I hope they stay safe.”
Marschall also spoke to some of the perils of the region, which are many.
Treacherous Rocks
If authorities found King’s camp in the area, then they’d likely focus their efforts on the paths between the summit and his camp, Marschall speculated.
It’s less surprising that King should go missing on the descent rather than on the climb, since descents tend to be more problematic, he said.
Marschall said Eagle Peak is not the park’s hardest climb, though it is the tallest. And its difficulty is relative: a newer mountaineer would find it daunting while an experienced one may find it routine.
One challenge is the rock bands.
Bands of brittle volcanic rock ring the mountain, separated by more sloped, roughly 20-yard intervals of scree, or loose rock and dirt. Though the rock bands look sturdier than the scree, they’re deceptive. They can break apart vertically just as one finds a foothold or a handhold on them.
“There’s one easy route through this rock cliff band, and if you missed that, you would be stuck trying to go down the steep sections of the rock band,” said Marschall. “It’s not pleasant climbing at all.”
The terrain is jumbled, he added.
Pine Nuts
All of Yellowstone is grizzly bear country, said Marschall. But in mid-September, the bears will climb to higher elevations to harvest white bark pine nuts or rob them off squirrels.
“I would not be surprised at all to run into a grizzly bear this time of year,” he said.
Climbers on the route in question may have to choose between the perils of the mountain and those of the bear, he said: going off trail may make for an easier trip down, but it heightens the risk of surprising a grizzly bear.
Weather
The weather could complicate any other danger.
Accuweather documented a 48-degree high and a 32-degree, or freezing, low temperature for Yellowstone for Tuesday. But different regions and levels of the park can have varying weather on the same day.
“You could be in one corner of the park and it could be sunny and the other corner could be snowing,” Frank James, owner of Mountain Man Guiding, told Cowboy State Daily in a Monday text message.
James conducts tours of wildlife areas, geothermal features and day hikes. He was not in the park last Tuesday, and hasn’t hiked Eagle Peak. But he’s heard it lauded as a “brutal hike,” not helped by its remote location.
“(It’s) very long just to get to the base of the mountain,” said James.
Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
