In 1992, 10 years after lost hunter George Wescott walked out of the woods near Greenville after having been given up for dead by the Maine Warden Service search and rescue team, Wescott told his story to Bangor Daily News outdoor writer Bud Leavitt.
Wescott was very critical of the search efforts, contending that the Warden Service’s “search profile” of him was way off the mark.
The search profile described Wescott as a smoker, and a middle-aged man who was overweight and out of shape. Wescott said he did not smoke and, as a career construction worker, was hardly overweight and certainly not out of shape.
Looking back at the difficult conditions under which Wescott survived his three-week ordeal with severely frost-bitten feet and toes, it is hard to quibble with his grit, determination and physical condition.
Today, 42 years after the aborted search for Wescott, the Maine Warden Service’s search and rescue team is performing its mission with proven skill, professionalism and a high degree of success.
Maine Wardens receive on the average of 500 missing person calls a year, according to Warden Lt. Josh Bubier, who heads up Maine’s search and rescue operation.
When a hunter or a dementia patient is reported missing, and the search and rescue team swings into action, one of the first steps is to interview friends or relatives and establish a profile of the missing person based on the information gathered using a standard questionnaire.
Bubier said that, as it turns out, many of the calls never require a search. Often the missing hunter finds his own way out of the woods, or the dementia patient is found before the Wardens launch a search.
If somebody is missing, how do you know when it’s appropriate to make that call to the Maine Warden Service?
Bubier emphasized that time is always important in any search operation, that concerned relatives or friends of a missing person should not hesitate to make that call. In other words, if in doubt, call.
“Nobody gets in any trouble for a false alarm,” Bubier said.
Most modern search and rescue personnel acknowledge that with today’s cellphones more and more outdoor people, especially hikers, are given a false sense of confidence and assume that if they get in trouble, help is a click away.
“Often, they strike out not well prepared,” Bubier said. Cellphones don’t always work in the woods far from cell towers. New Hampshire, particularly, has experienced hiker after hiker who has had to be rescued in the White Mountains after getting into trouble.
New Hampshire, as well as Maine, has a provision in the law that allows the state to send a bill to an irresponsible hiker for the cost of search efforts rendered. New Hampshire in a few instances has invoked the law. Maine, to date, has not.
If the past is prologue, a few of Maine’s more than 200,000 licensed deer hunters this fall will wind up lost in the woods. Those of us best prepared will tell someone where we are going, be warmly dressed, have a survival kit that includes food and a source of flame and know how to keep a cool head.
Finally, burn this somewhat shopworn old caveat into your psyche: Admit you are lost, sit down, start a fire, stay put and prepare for a long night. You will be found by the Maine Warden Service.
V. Paul Reynolds is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal. He is also a Maine Guide and host of a weekly radio program “Maine Outdoors” heard Sundays at 7 p.m. on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network.
