Mother and daughter missing from tent
By Hal Fulkman
At 10:00
Sunday morning I received a phone call from Al
Andrews informing me that there was a search on
the Ortega Highway above Lake Elsinore. Putting
my gear in the car, I soon began the better than
an hours drive to the rendezvous. The day was
slightly overcast and by the time I reached the
summit overlooking Lake Elsinore, it had begun to
drizzle.
Upon arriving
at the upper San Juan Campground, I noticed there
was an unusual amount of Riverside County
Sheriffs vehicles which gave me a
suspicious undertone to this mission. After
signing in, I discussed the details of the search
with Jim Fairchild who had arrived about 20
minutes before I had. Jim told me that a 35 year
old mother, Peggy Hunter, and her 12 year old
daughter, Jennifer Hunter had vanished sometime
between 9:30 Saturday night and early Sunday
morning when the rest of the 14 people they were
camped with awoke.
After Mr.
Hunter and the other members of the group had
searched the campground, they decided to call for
help. Jim went on to say that the tent in which
Peggy and Jennifer were sleeping had been ripped
open in the back. Upon examining the ripped
portion of the tent, it seemed a rather small
hole. When we talked to Mr. Hunter about the
hole, he couldn't remember if it had been torn
before Saturday night or not.
Further
questioning of Mr. Hunter revealed that his wife
and daughter could only be wearing the clothes
they went to bed in, which were only night gowns.
Mr. Hunter said every other article of clothing
and personal possession was accounted for. Close
examination of the campsite turned up only one
set of footprints that were quickly obscured
under a multitude of other footprints. Obviously,
the rest of the party did not at first consider
the disappearance serious because they had broken
camp and cleaned up the site thoroughly.
So, individual
teams were formed with the assignment to cut
wider and wider perimeters around the campsite in
hopes of discovering tracks. John Dew and his son
Richard's assignment was to search through the
surrounding campsite checking for tracks and
inquiring of other campers. Steve Zappe and I
made up one team and our assignment ultimately
brought us around to shouting distance of John
and Richard.
When John
spotted us, he yelled for me to come over, for
he'd found something. As I got to him, John said
that Richard had discovered a track and he wanted
me to look at it to see what I thought. Richard
had definitely turned up a print of a bare foot
that looked just the right size for the mother.
The ground was very hard and even our lugged sole
boots were not leaving prints. The footprints
soon disappeared.
So, we once
again started in the same direction as the last
clear track we found hoping to turn up another
print. Within 30 minutes John discovered a night
gown that looked to be that of a young girl's
discarded in a bush. We immediately radioed base
camp for the sheriff. After the sheriff had
examined the article he returned with it to base
camp where Mr. Hunter identified it as being his
daughter's. We intensified our search in that
area and put in a call to Sierra Madre Search
& Rescue and Hemet Search & Rescue for
assistance. Also, Don Landells' helicopter was
summoned.
The brush soon
became so thick that it was almost impenetrable.
So Don Landells and a RMRU observation team flew
the area in the helicopter very slowly, searching
every possible place they could. In some cases
the helicopter was hovering on top of the brush.
The ground crews and the helicopter, after many
hours of intense searching, turned up no tracks
or clues as to the two females whereabouts. So,
the helicopter was sent away and the ground crews
were sent back into base camp.
At this time Sierra Madre's
Bloodhounds were given scent articles and
directed to find the two females. The dogs picked
up their trail and in a short time arrived at the
place where we had found the night gown. The dogs
went from there through some heavy brush, down a
steep hill, and up to a turnout along the
highway. The dogs were brought back several times
and restarted and each time the story was the
same.
The search
continued through Sunday night with some of the
members and the dogs searching the highway both
above and below the campground.
Monday morning
the search and rescue teams were given the task
of searching the more remote canyons in the
neighboring area. At the same time about 25 U.S.
Forestry fire fighters were brought into the
campground to do a bush to bush type search. Both
groups turned up no new clues except to eliminate
one more aspect of the search.
Monday
afternoon the teams were divided up and the edge
of the highway and the river that parallels the
highway were searched simultaneously for 8 miles
below the campground and 5 miles above. This also
proved fruitless. We were summoned back to base
camp, and together with the Sheriff's Department,
the entire operation was critiqued step by step.
It was the consensus of the Sheriff's Department
and all the search and rescue teams involved that
the area had been searched thoroughly and we
could be of no further use. The Sheriff's
Department thanked us for our help and they
proceeded with the possibility that the mother
and daughter had met with foul play.
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