High Sierra Topix

Perhaps I'm wrong, but what I understood is that in National Forest initiated SARS, the Sheriffs office controls, in National Park, NPS controls. Is this correct AT?

I read that the Sierra Madre SAR folks have sent teams over the last couple of days as well. Hopefully, now that the gentleman missing out of Shaver and found near Cathedral LK has been extracted, there may be more westside resources to add to the search.

All the info is coming from SEKI so I have assumed they are running the search.

When we had a search that crossed jurisdictions last year, a park rep was present at ics but the search began in inyo. We were running our own but coordinating with SEKI and inyo closely. It depends on the incident.

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A few words about jurisdictions:

Source: http://community.discovery.com/eve/foru ... 2351954909" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

· The first helicopter to respond to my location could not complete the evacuation because I was on the Sequoia side of the boundary! It comes as a shock to realize that the government agencies involved might jeopardize a life in defense of their territorial jurisdiction, but that is what seems to have happened in this case. How frequently might this happen in the Sierras? One would think that mutual assistance agreements between all government agencies adjoining the Sierras would be established in advance so that a rescue would not have to be delayed just because of a jurisdictional matter.

Hope these discrepancies have been resolved long time ago.

I am assuming that the NPS is in charge at this point. Inyo SAR started it out because the trailhead Is Inyo and did the intitial search up to Taboose pass, but the entire search area at this point is in SEKI boundaries

Did not want to distract from the search thread so I am making separate one and locking it so it will not spend much time on top of the board.

I will no longer be a Moderator on HST effective today, Eric has been notified. Shawn and Sparky, who will be taking time off from there work to check to eastern side of Taboose Pass over the weekend, I would like to thank you so very much for your commitment beyond just words.
These two yes only two have been the only ones to volunteer from HST!
With all the experience we have here, the not wanting to get involved beyond words is disgusting to me.
The other volunteers are folks who signed up to HST just so they could help with the effort without even knowing Larry or enjoy his many TR's and intel on conditions in the Sierra over the years that many here have enjoyed and benefited from.
I really believed we would come together as a Sierra loving community for one of our own, but I guess that was just my naive belief in my fellow human being.
Before I go would like to thank Shawn and Sparky again, also express my sincere gratitude to all of those who offered beta, intel, equipment behind the scenes!
Will continue to work with the folks from SoCAl and try to get something off the ground for this weekend, and will keep in touch, updating those who kept it real in this effort.
What hurts the most is that if any other member would have been the one missing Larry would have been one of the first to volunteer.

Been following this story since first reported. I think everyone is learning some valuable lessons about solo hiking. I do it a lot, although no where near as hardcore as most of you on this forum. I'm glad to hear some members have volunteered to help try and locate this man. I have none of the late season equipment required to even participate. I'm sure a lot of us are similar "summer" soldiers, not "winter" warriors.

I'm sure a lot more would love to help, but the pros are doing their best, and abandoning all to join an amateur expedition, although noble, seems likely an interference with our public safety professionals.

I realize there are a lot of emotions, and it is very sad that we have apparently lost a fine moderator over some of the moral and emotional issues involved. I just pray that the professional teams stay at it and successfully rescue our fellow forum member.

John Harper

Yes, sorry we are losing Maverick, but we are not an uncaring group. We are all frustrated - I live literally a stone's throw from Taboose, but have neither the experience, equipment or stamina to do a hike over that pass.

Like many others here, I am watching this thread intently, but I've never done any winter backpacking and would be a liability to any search effort I fear. I wish I could help... it's very said, I hope he ends up being OK.

Yeah it's too bad Maverick left. He shouldn't think people don't want to help but sometimes we just can't. I'd love to be up there looking but I only have 10 dollars right now. Then throw in the fact that I do not drive means getting to and from Taboose is a problem.

A brief note on jurisdiction. In most of the country, the county Sheriff has responsibility for search and rescue within their county. There's a couple of states which have a central SAR organization (I think). But in NPS areas, NPS has exclusive responsibility for SAR. So on a SAR that crosses an agency boundary, like this one, they're coordinated but Inyo Sheriff searches the east side and NPS Sequoia Park the west side. It's worked reasonably well for years. Don't know what happened on that 2007 Whitney thing. On the whole, neither agency can land a helicopter within the other's area without notification but I'm a little suspicious that it didn't have the ability to land that high.

Reading today's NPS notice, yes, ground teams have been taken out ahead of possible weather coming in. They'll continue the air search as they can. I'm sure if clues show up, they'll put ground teams back in but it appears the search has been scaled back.

Requiescat in pace.

g.