Officials say a man who was lost for 24 hours while hiking Colorado’s highest mountain ignored repeated phone calls from rescuers because they came from an unknown number.
Lake County Search and Rescue said the hiker went missing around 8 p.m. on October 18, failing to return to where he was staying.
Repeated attempts to contact the man through calls, texts and voicemail messages were ignored, as did a Statement issued by the agency.
Five rescuers were deployed around 10 a.m. to search for “high-probability areas” off Mount Albert, but failed to locate the missing hiker on the 4401-metre-high (14,440 ft) peak the next morning. Came back at 3 o’clock.
A second team set out at 7 a.m. the next day to search areas where hikers “usually lose the trail” only to find that the man had returned to his place of stay at 9:30 a.m. .
The hiker told officers that he lost his way around nightfall and was “trying to locate the proper trailhead” before reaching his car the next morning, about 24 hours after setting out on the hike.
Lake County Search and Rescue said the man reported “not knowing” that anyone was looking for him.
“One noteworthy point is that the subject ignored repeated phone calls from us because they did not recognize the number,” the agency said.
“If you are overdue according to your itinerary, and you get frequent calls from an unknown number, please answer the phone; It could be a search and rescue team trying to confirm that you are safe!”
More than 32 hours were devoted to the search. The news that the hiker had ignored the call of the rescue team led to a flurry of furious reactions from members of the public.
Lake County Search and Rescue responded to a Facebook post, “Please remember that what seems like common sense isn’t obvious to a subject at a time when they get lost and panicked.”
“In Colorado, people who spend time outside have a good understanding of the search and rescue infrastructure that is in place to help them, but this is not the case nationwide.”