Keep your fingers crossed for the missing ranger
Jeff is an aquiantance of mine. Others may know him as he is a Winter Park ski patroller. I hope everything turns out for the best.
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_2904318
http://extras.mnginteractive.com/liv...0801ranger.jpg
Quote:
Worried searchers comb park for ranger
By George Merritt
Denver Post Staff Writer
Jeff Christensen, 31, has been missing since Friday. He carried a radio and possibly a cellphone, but nothing has been heard from him. (Special)
Rocky Mountain National Park - Park rangers searched for one of their own Sunday, two days after a fit and experienced member of their team went into the backcountry and did not return.
Jeff Christensen, 31, was last seen when he left alone for a patrol of the rugged and remote Mummy Range about 11 a.m. Friday.
"We are very positive," spokeswoman Kyle Patterson said of the attitude of the rescue teams. "Jeff is young, he's fit. ... This is his fourth year as a seasonal ranger."
Still, with no word from Christensen for a third consecutive day, Patterson said time "is of the essence."
She said rescuers are conducting the same kind of search they would for any healthy individual missing in the park. But she said there is an obvious personal concern.
"The only thing that is different is that in the back of their minds, they know this is a co-worker," she said.
No one can remember a ranger going missing for more than an afternoon.
Christensen is a "kindred spirit" who worked on search and rescue. If it had been one of them missing, searchers know, Christensen would have been out looking for them.
About 50 people from the park staff, area sheriffs' offices and the Rocky Mountain Rescue Group, as well as Front Range Rescue dogs, took part Sunday in the second day of the massive search.
Two helicopters - one equipped with a device to look for body heat - also patrolled the steep, high-altitude area.
But the going is tough. Mount Chapin at 12,454 feet and Mount Chiquita at 13,069 feet mark the terrain.
Patterson said the area is popular with cross-country
skiers, but when the snow melts there are few, if any, foot trails.
"This is not a flat meadow," she said.
Christensen left from the Chapin Pass Trailhead off Old Fall River Road on Friday with plans to return to the Lawn Lake Trailhead by that evening.
Patterson said friends report they knew of no personal issues Christensen was dealing with recently.
It's certain that he carried a radio Friday. And officials said his pack probably contained camping essentials: food, water, a headlamp, matches and rain gear. He probably had his Park Service commissioned pistol and may have had a cellphone.
That they have not heard from Christensen over his radio "does give us some concern," Patterson said, but not too much. It is possible his batteries are dead, or he could be in one of the many drainages or gullies where radio reception is spotty at best, she said.
Christensen, who lives in Fraser, has worked for the ski patrol in Winter Park during the winters. Some of his friends from the area helped search for him Sunday.
