Great news!Skier found on c.v.r./sugarloaf area....

amazing kid.very happy for him and family....since he was found on the c.v.r and was b.c. skiing thought it was relevant to the forum
http://abcnews.go.com/News/missing-teenage-skier-found-alive-maine/story?id=18656401
congrats to snowmobiler who found him..

Wow - that's amazing. He's been lost for nearly two days. This morning when I saw the news item that he was missing, I thought - 'that poor kid is toast'. Am so glad he's been found.

It will be interesting to hear from him, when he's ready, how he handled the long cold night on the mountain. So glad he was found! I bet his parents are keeping him safe at home for the remainder of the ski season. Phew!

Glad he's found. The article is lacking any details. It would be interesting to know the story. (And, what's "c.v.r"? Is that the "Caribou Pond Road"?)

TCD said:

Glad he's found. The article is lacking any details. It would be interesting to know the story. (And, what's "c.v.r"? Is that the "Caribou Pond Road"?)

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Yes. It's the road between Sugarloaf and Reddington and the Crockers.

I read somewhere on FB that he'd built an igloo/quinzee... not confirmed.

Tim

bikehikeskifish said:

I read somewhere on FB that he'd built an igloo/quinzee... not confirmed.

Tim

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If so that will be a good story for the grand kids in fifty years. Sounds like he went sniffing for the goods. Glad he is OK. That's a long time to be out with what I would assume must have been minumal gear. DH boots alone are by far not the warmest footwear to begin with. Definitely Epic!

First of all, way to go young man, on keeping safe and getting found!

I'm not a skier, but wouldn't it make sense to retrace ones steps back to the ski slopes? If he was reported missing at 1PM, he had plenty of time to get back up.

Caribou POND/VALLEY Road, the sign says POND, is very close to at least 1 condo on the Sugarloaf property, you can see it quite easily, maybe only .25 miles from the road at one point. The only snag is you have to cross the stream/river that flows down the valley.

Knowing that area pretty well, I wonder if he poked around on the summit and went down the hiking trail that goes down the back side and intersects with the AT. That little (.5 mile) trail would be fairly easy to ski or especially board. Once at the AT, it is pretty flat until you approach Spaulding Mtn. At that point he might have decided to bail out down into the Caribou pond watershed which appears pretty tame for that vantage point. I bushwhacked and followed old logging roads in there last summer looking for my dog and it's not too bad to get through with lots of cut over areas which when buried in snow seem like golf course fairways. Snowsled trails go through there and one could definately hear them from the AT. Hope we hear more about his adventure.

Tom Rankin said:

I'm not a skier, but wouldn't it make sense to retrace ones steps back to the ski slopes? If he was reported missing at 1PM, he had plenty of time to get back up.

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Going back uphill for any real distance with downhill bindings and boots is very, very difficult. (Another reason why evolution favors us users of Nordic gear. )

I was once on a search for a guy out at Olympic National Park in similar circumstances. He skied for miles downhill before he was found. The people who get lost at Killington and the like are usually found to have traveled downhill.

Tom Rankin said:

I'm not a skier, but wouldn't it make sense to retrace ones steps back to the ski slopes? If he was reported missing at 1PM, he had plenty of time to get back up.

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He was most likely using downhill ski gear which makes climbing up any distance very difficult. (Backcountry hill skiers use alpine touring or telemark gear and skins for climbing.) His next alternative would have been to bare boot. If he was off the groomed trails, the snow might have been too soft to support him. His final alternative might have been to lay down on the snow surface and try to "swim" along it.

In other words, uphill travel may have been essentially impossible.


I haven't seen any info on what happened to his skis, but since he was walking along the snowmobile trail where he was found, it is likely that he left them somewhere.

More info:
http://www.wcsh6.com/news/article/233751/2/Missing-Sugarloaf-skier-found-alive-
http://www.boston.com/metrodesk/201...joy-healthy/BXt5Cp6WZQKOzS5XHlCx4J/story.html
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/03/0...s-teen-continues-at-maine-sugarloaf-mountain/
http://www.sunjournal.com/news/franklin/2013/03/05/missing-sugarloaf-skier-found-alive/1329461

Doug

Ditto on DougPaul's comments.

I think that many of us have been on that road in doing Crockers, Redington, Sugarloaf, etc. along the AT. As remote as it is, it's a favorite for local snowmobilers and hunters. The kid had the good fortune to go down the western flank of the mountain. Had he gone down the other side, it might have been a different, sad story.

We spotted a car there many years ago. When we arrived, the battery completely died right when we had finished using our giant cellular bag phone (remember those?) to call AAA. We were prepared for a long wait, and possible ~4mi hike to the highway but, to our pleasant surprise, AAA arrived before we could brew our coffee! AAA driver was only to happy to do a "rescue" down the Caribou Valley Road, since it was right before hunting season. He said that it's very popular with local sportsman year round.

So lucky kid, indeed! A teachable moment, if there ever was one!