Post by keninga on Dec 16, 2020 22:43:42 GMT
I have to confess I'm not sure what the creature was, but I can tell you it wasn't a bear. Here's the story, you decide.
I was watching a YouTube video just the other day and it reminded me of when I was up in Western Virginia. Beautiful part of the country, Appalachian Trail passes very near the Roanoke and Craig county line. Just over in Craig County is the spot where Audie Murphy’s plane went down and he was killed. I’ve hiked up to the site and seen the monument that marks the site now. This was back in the mid-nineties.
I had a friend who worked as a volunteer with the Craig County Emergency Services give me a call one evening; he explained they were organizing a search for a couple hikers that were last reported going off trail to see the memorial. They’re over due and no one has seen them. I never could say no to helping search for someone who’s lost, some day someone might be looking for me, it’s a Karma thing.
Next morning I get myself all geared up and out the door, it’s a Saturday and I drive to where he told me to meet up with them. We hook up and while I’m about twenty years younger then and I sort of make a visual survey around me and I think I managed to count the other people my age who were there on the fingers of one hand, and damned if I didn’t have fingers left over. There were several county police officers there, however all but one of them didn’t look like they could walk more than a couple hundred yards, sadly too many stops at the donut shop. Now, let me say this, I don’t mean no disrespect to law enforcement, no, not at all. Most police keep themselves in great shape now-a-days however, this is a little small county that doesn’t pay much and they sort of have to take what they can get, if you get what I’m saying. Can’t have too many physical requirements or they might not have any law enforcement. The rest, I swear are twenty something’s, and a about a quarter of them look like they should still be in high school.
So I’m talking to Jimmy and he says we’re about to be briefed by the Chief, sure enough as he finished saying that “the Chief” comes out and I almost snickered. The Chief was the Fire Chief for the county and when it came to search and rescue he was the county coordinator. What I thought was funny was he was wearing a huge white Fireman’s ceremonial helmet that had “Chief” on it in huge letters across the front. This was mainly due to the fire department having the best communication system in the county, even better than the 911 lines. So we form up in front of a large scale map of the county and he points to it and gives us a rundown of what they know. Then he sets about making up groups as he didn’t want anyone going off alone. He puts me in with a group of young guys, first thing that went through my mind was, “Oh great! I’m a damn baby sitter.”
So the Chief is going around and giving various groups area assignments and getting the names and addresses of everyone involved. He gets over to my group and we already have our information written down and he takes out his smaller map and assigns us an area. I have my map pouch with me and I take out the topo map for the area he’s assigned us and I start marking it off on my map. Then he says to me, “You have your own maps?” I said, “Well, yes sir.” He looks at me and asks, “You got a compass?” I said, “Yeah, in my truck with my gear.”
“Gear? You have your own gear?” Now I was getting a little surprised. “Well, yeah.” Then I said, “Chief this area you given us to search will take the better part of the day and that’s assuming we don’t have anything happen to slows us down.” Chief just sort of smiled, “What’s your background?” I said, “I’m an engineer.” He looked at me a little closer like he was sizing up a horse he was going to buy. “Engineer, huh? Not much engineering out here, what experience you got tracking?” I thought, “Jeez, is this an interview?” Then I replied, “Well I do a lot of hunting.” I wasn’t going to say Bigfoot hunting; because I was pretty sure this old boy would have run me off as a crazy. “And I do a lot of off trail hiking.” Now his eyes sort of lit up. “You do, huh?” I nodded. “Take a good look at your map and tell me what you think these fellows might have done.” I look at the map for a bit and say. “Well, they were last seen about here, which is where the parking lot is located. My guess is they probably made as straight a course toward the monument, and most likely they used the trail to hike up to the monument.” The Chief asked, “You think they would have gone back the same way? I looked at him and said, “Nope, hikers don’t like looking at the same things more than once as a general rule. My guess is the monument was just a jumping off point for them.” He smiled, “That’s the way I figured it too.” Then I offered up. “That part of Craig County is pretty remote. Hell Chief, if it wasn’t for old Audie Murphy getting himself killed there odds are hardly anyone would be there.” Then I paused, “Chief I know you’ve already thought about this but how about shiners and pot growers? If those boys ran afoul of any of them I’d bet we’ll never find them.” He looked at me, “You think like I do, but according to the Police Chief they don’t have any activity in those areas because while they’re remote, there’s no easy way to get supplies in there. You gotta have sugar and you gotta have corn and you gotta have water, not much of those in that area. And to make any money growing pot you need fewer trees, or the plants won’t get enough sunlight.”
In about an hour we all had our assignments and teams so we drove to the parking lot at the monument. It was a gravel road as there was little traffic and we all got out and started getting out gear together and in a few minutes I was ready. Unfortunately the other team members wanted to continue to talk to their buddies. The one guy with the radio, myself and two young fellows were ready. I looked over at them and said, “Ok guys, we’re outa here.” They looked at me like I was speaking another language. They had a surprised look on their faces and said, “Oh, we’re not going back to the station?” Now I had the odd look, “Why would we be doing that?” Then the one said, “Because all our gear is back there.” I looked at the other boy, “Yours too?” He just nodded with a dumb look on his face. I thought to myself, “Oh for the love of Pete.” I said, “Well, you two go get your gear and get another assignment, because we don’t have time to wait for you.” Then the one guy said, “But…..but, we didn’t know this was taking us to where to look.” I looked at him and said, “No problem, just get another assignment after you get your gear. I’m sure the Chief will have plenty of them to give out.” Then they looked at each other and then back at the friends they were paying so much attention to and they just laughed and shrugged. Then he turned back and said, “Well, all we really need is water and you got plenty of that…..” I cut him off. “Young man, I don’t carry water for others, nor do I carry gear for anyone but me, and we have an assignment. Same one you were supposed to have only you didn’t bring your gear.” With that I turned and said “Come on guys.” There seems to some in every crowd who thinks that this is just a game and they don’t have to pay attention.
We came up to the monument and I looked around, not too much to see really as the trees were close in on us. I took out my topo map and said, “Ok we go this way.” Just then the guy with the radio said, “Well, I’m in charge of this group.” I looked at him and said, “Ok, you’re in charge.” I put my map in my pocket and said, “Which way do we go?” He looked at me and said, “Can I see the map?” He said. “You don’t have a map? How you gonna lead us?” He looked at me a little dumbfounded and said, “Well, you have a map.” I shook my head, “Son, let me enlighten you. You are not in charge, you’re the radio operator. How old are you?” He sort of put his head down and said, “Seventeen.” I knew he was young but not that young. “Ok, you need to make contact with the base and make sure the radio is working properly because once we drop down a couple hundred feet into these washes it’s probably not going to work.” He just sort of shook his head and started with the radio check. At this point I was wondering what we were going to do, I’d already had two children self eliminate and now suddenly the guy with the radio thinks he’s the one in charge. I looked up and said softly to the sky, “What’s next?”
So we head off and it’s not a bad drop down, a little steep here and there but really no big deal, then we get down to the bottom and one of the guys is sucking wind like crazy. I look at him and ask, “What’s wrong?” And he’s huffing and puffing so badly I was wondering if maybe he was going to have a heart attack. He looked at me with sweat pouring off him, “Man, that climb down was ungodly.” Now I was confused. “Dude, we didn’t have to climb anything, all we did was drop down, you know with gravity sort of helping us.” I wasn’t breathing hard and hadn’t even broken a sweat and this guy was all messed up. “Dude, tell me something, if you knew you weren’t in any kind of shape to be doing a search for hikers, why are you here?” He looked at me like I was crazy. “Because my Buddies were coming to help out.” I looked at him and said. “Well, this you just did is nothing, in just a bit we have to climb; that means go up. You think you’re sucking wind now, going against gravity will kill you.” He got a look of sudden realization on his face. “Son, why don’t you go back the parking lot and see if you can help them out there, because you’re just slowing us down?” He looked up the mountain and back at me and said, “Back up there?” He started shaking his head and got this very concerned look on his face and said, “I can’t make it, not by myself.” This was getting ridiculous. “I’m not going to carry you and we’re supposed to be a six man team, when you leave, we’re down to three. That means we can’t cover or search but half the ground we’re supposed to cover because you shouldn’t be here.“ Poor kid looked hurt but honestly, he was exhausted from hiking down a mountain and he was slowing us down and he knew it. “All you have to do is climb right back up the way we came.” Now he looked distressed, “You can’t leave me here alone.” I couldn’t believe this, not only was he out of shape but now he was turning into a damn sissy boy. I stopped him, “You aren’t alone, you are two hundred yards from the monument, there are people up there because that’s where the guy is who’s relaying the radio communications for all the parties over here, is located because it’s a high point.” He looked at me and said, “How do you know that?” Now I lost it completely, “Because we covered all this in the meeting we had with the Chief! And you’d have known that had you been paying attention.” But suffice it to say that I ripped off a tirade of things better not repeated here in a highly agitated state. Upon finishing, Bubba decided he could find his way back to civilization on his own, no problem. Suddenly he found a lot of strength and was going uphill like it wasn’t a huge problem at all, so long as he could get away from me.
So now I walk back over to the other two and tried to talk in a much calmer voice, “Ok guys, is there some problem or issue that you two might have that’s going to prevent you from actually do what we’ve come here to do and that’s help find these guys?” The two of them started shaking their heads negatively. “Do either one of you have some injury, or maybe you’re just not up to the task…….either one of you got your period maybe? Or maybe you got a sore ^%$#*?” Now they were smiling. “Ok, let’s go.”
We spread out but stayed within eyesight at all times, a couple time I had to shout to get one of them to get back but all in all our search was going well. We’d covered a couple miles and were taking a break, and of course we were talking about what might have happened to the guy, and yes this was long before the book “Missing 411”, but it wasn’t odd to have people disappear at all. One of the guys asked if I’d ever been on a search before and I told them I had, I was a hiker and there’s sort of an understanding that when people are needed to search for hikers, others will stop what they are doing and help out. “This happen a lot?” one of the guys asked, “It happens more than I think most people might realize, but it’s not uncommon for someone to have to take a “one” or “two” break and step off a trail, take care of business and then start walking to where they thought the trail was and suddenly realize they’re lost.” They looked at me like they didn’t believe me. “Seriously guys; then what happens is panic sets in, shear, unadulterated panic, abject fear, the kind that happens to little kids when they get lost in a department store and they look around and can’t find Mommy.” Now I could see I was making a connection with them because most all of us have gotten lost in a department store as children. “And really, they aren’t far from their Mom or Dad they just panicked, same thing happens with adults.
Tell you a quick story; back in the day when I was a Boy Scout I was out with a couple guys who were training for their map reading and hiking merit badges. I already had mine so I was going out with them. It was a simple over nighter, about five or six miles out camp out and come back the next day to the same location for one of the guy’s dad to pick us up. So what happens is we are following this one guy’s navigation and all’s well until he looks around and says there should be an old cemetery here. He checks his map and suddenly he freaks out, he has the wrong map and he panics, just goes off the deep end. He suddenly starts running like mad, crying, screaming, just a total mess. I see what’s happened and I see the other boy is like in almost a trance like state. I tell him to stay there don’t move. I dropped my pack and take off after my runner. The good news is he started getting hot and tired and was dropping his gear and leaving a trail. I finally caught him and had to tackle him. He was fighting me, his eyes were completely glazed over, I seriously doubt he’d have recognized his own mother at that moment.
Finally, I had to punch him in the gut to get him to break the panic. He coughed, and everything and finally I got him up and we started walking back, picking up his gear as we went. We got back to the other boy who was coming out of his trance and I told them both, we are not lost. I explained that what we’d do is go back to where we started and they both said that wasn’t where the Dad was going to pick us up. I told them when they were overdue the father would check the other place before he got worried and the next day we got out and just before the Dad got there I told them there was no reason to worry and we didn’t need to talk about any more.” The guys just sort of looked at me and I said, “Being scared is a terrible thing, and panic will get you killed. And it happens to people all the time.”
Right then the radio started squawking but we couldn’t hear everything so I told the guy to climb up higher and see what he could find out. He kind of looked like he wasn’t sure and I said, “Do you need someone to go with you?” He didn’t give any indication, just sort of looked up the mountain and back at me. I shook my head and told the other boy to go with him, but come right back here when they got some news.
In about thirty minutes they were coming back all excited, they’d found one of the hikers alive but he was not able to speak or tell them anything. “Ok, where’d they find him?” I asked as I was taking out my map. He told me and I found the approximate area which was about four miles ahead of us. “Chief said he wanted us to spread out and come down this little valley.” He pointed to it. That made good sense because that’s sort of a natural path through these mountains. “Ok. Let’s fan out but stay in sight of each other at all times. Guys pay attention to what’s around you and to each other so we don’t give them another reason to have to search for us.”
We start moving along the bottom and it’s pretty obvious that we really need more guys and right now I wishing the guys I sent back were here now, but odds are the guys who couldn’t remember to bring their own gear and the one guy whose idea of a heavy work out was sitting front of his video games. However, I took a second and said to the guys, “Fellows, I know it’s just us, so really keep your eyes open and search as best you can, but no matter what, keep in sight of each other at all times. If one of you wants to move over to check something out tell the other guy so he can ease over toward you.” They gave an ok sign, and back to it we went.
We looked for about an hour and covered about a mile, maybe a little more, all of a sudden one of the guys says, “Hey! I got something here.” Naturally, we collapsed in to where he was and sure enough, we had what appeared to be blood on the ground and judging from the way the leaves were disturbed something happened here. I took out my map and located it as best I could. You have to remember that at this time I didn’t have a GPS locator, and it was old fashioned dead reckoning. The boy with the radio said, “I need to call this in.” I looked at him and said, “You’re right but let’s make sure there isn’t anything else for us to tell them.” He looked at me funny, but this was thirty feel from an almost vertical wall. “Let’s make a quick sweep and see if we find anything else. And if you do don’t touch anything.” So we started spreading out and one of the guys quickly located where the rocks make a corner and so we came over and went around. First thing I noticed was a very distinct smell of a body, not stinking, but if you hunt you know what a kill smells like. I looked over at the guys and said, “You smell that?” The guys nodded. We eased on around then one of the guys grabbed my arm and looked like he’d seen a ghost. I looked at him and saw him then looked where he was looking and saw what had shocked him. There on the ground is a severed head. Then all of a sudden the first boy was about the heave and I told him to go over there and let it go. Naturally the radio guy comes over and sees it and he starts heaving and I sent him over to puke with the other guy.
I walked over and got a close look, I was really glad the eyes were closed, that might have freaked me out. I looked around a bit and started find clothing shreds and the rest of the body parts. I couldn’t touch anything, but I really didn’t have to this guys had been completely deconstructed, arms, legs and head ripped pretty cleanly off the torso, then the arms and legs we ripped apart at the knees and elbows. Almost like you’d cut up a chicken you were getting ready to fry up for dinner.
Then I walked back over to where the guys were about done heaving. “How you guys doing?” Radio guy was getting better now and was actually helping the other boy. I forget their real names now but the non-radio guy was still a bit white in the face but was getting better. He looked at me and said, “I ain’t never seen anything like that.” I said, “God willing son, you never will again.” Then I said to Radio guy, “Now you need to call this in.” I looked at the other boy and said, “Can you go with him?” He nodded. “Ok, I’ll stay here but be sure that they understand there is no place for a helicopter to land, if they have get people here quickly they are going to have to do a rope insertion. Tell them I have a smoke marker and when we hear their engines I’ll light it and that will mark us.” He looked at me a little wild eyed with adrenaline and shook his head. “Ok, one more thing, don’t go into graphic detail on the radio. Just tell them we’ve found the body and they are going to need forensics.” He looked at me like it was his job. “You don’t want that shit being broadcasted out over the radio, every damn body with a police scanner will be on the phone to the press and that won’t help him and it’ll just add another layer of BS the Chief is going to have to deal with.” He looked at me and then nodded. Then he and the other boy headed off.
I watched them head up to the top of the mountain and I just sort of started looking about to see if I could locate anything else. And the more I looked at the crime scene the more I was bewildered. It was obvious that whatever had gotten hold of this fellow had simply ripped him up like a rag doll, just took him apart at the joints from what I could see there were no obvious bite marks, and no sign of consumption. Now I could touch anything and make a detailed inspection but no bite marks, then I noticed that I didn’t see any claw marks either. I went over to the torso and not a single claw mark or bit mark to be seen, I got to looking at the wounds and could tell whatever it was that got this boy had ripped him to pieces. The wounds weren’t like nice clean cuts they were like ripped off by something with great force and at great speed. I walked back over to the bloody mess we found at first and I walked down the other way a bit. I hadn’t looked down here because they found the head. As I looked around I saw something lying on the ground up ahead I walked up to it and saw it was a backpack……..still buckled like it would have been on a person but covered in blood. “Ok, there’s his backpack.” I thought to myself. So I made my way back over there sat down on a rock and began trying to put it all together. I took out my thermos of coffee and poured it into the cup and took a sip, still a nice temperature.
I just couldn’t get my head around it, a bear would have left bite wounds and claw marks and would most likely have eaten the torsos internal organs. Bears don’t care if it’s human or animal to them we’re just another meal. Then I got to thinking the only thing that could have done this was a bear, but we only have black bear in this area, and this looked nothing like a bear attack. Bears will kill something and come back later to eat it, they really enjoy rotting meat and will often kill something and let it sort of get ripe then eat it later. But not one claw mark and not a single tooth mark, not only that but sadly I have seen bear attacks before on humans and this doesn’t look like what I’ve seen in the past at all. It almost like something big and strong got pissed off at this fellow and took out its’ wrath on him and the tearing apart thing at all the large joints like that had to take the strength of a large and severely pissed off gorilla.
Then there’s the backpack two or three hundred yards away, still hooked up like it was on the guy, covered in blood and no sign of tooth or claw. I remember I started feeling a little uncomfortable and reached down and took out my trusty .45 ACP and racked the slide. While I was far from scared I was uneasy and felt better feeling I was more ready. I slide the pistol back in holster and checked the safety, but I didn’t close the flap so I can draw and fire quickly if need be. I’m not normally skittish but I have to admit with a boy all ripped apart and no clear idea what did it I just felt prudence was the better part of valor.
I guess about thirty or so minutes later the two guys came down all excited, both of them talking at the same time and each oblivious to the other talking. “Whoa, whoa, slow down guys. One at a time.” They were still trying to talk over each other and I finally got them to settle down, “Chief said he’s sending a whole team out here by helicopter.” Then the other boy kicked in, “He said it’s gonna be one of those military choppers from Ft. Picket or Langley. They gonna drop down by ropes…..and they gonna bring all their gear and Chief said they was gonna pick us up and get us back so we could tell our story to him.” Dude was so excited that I think if I had checked he’d have had wood. Just wide-eyed excited. “When they think they’re close to us, they gonna call us on the radio and that’s when you need to set off that smoke. “Got it.” I said. Bless his heart I don’t think he’s had this much excitement in his life. “Ok, so how long before they get here?” Radio guys spoke and said, “Chief said it might be a couple hours, they gotta get everything loaded and get here, then they’ll need to refuel in Roanoke.”
Honestly, I didn’t think time could pass any slower and those two guys were high as a kite from the adrenaline. Have to admit I might have been like them at that age too but finally we heard the distinct sound of a helicopter and I got out my smoker right as the radio came to life. “Tell him we hear his engines and we’re popping red smoke to mark his best drop point.” Radio guy was telling him and set off my smoker and watched a plumb of smoke come out of that thing like it was no one’s business. Then the helo parked over us and down came the guys on ropes like professionals and down came more guys and then came gear. Then that hello moved and another started dropping gear and more guys. It was a site to behold. First guy came over and asked me where the body was, it was hard to hear him over the rotor of the hellos. We took him over and showed him everything we’d found and, of course he wanted to know if we’d touched anything and we told him no. Also told him where my two guys puked, they look embarrassed but better than getting tagged as a suspect. Then the helos both flew off. I looked at him as the roar died down. “That’s better, looks like we’re walking out then.” The guy said, “Nope you guys get to fly out, they need to get refueled first.”
They started doing a proper sweep as they had more people than we did and we just got out of the way and let them do their thing. In a bit the guy came over again and said the hello was coming back up.”So get ready they’ll be here in about twenty minutes.” I looked at him, “Sure would be curious what it was that attacked that guy?” I asked him, “Oh it’s a bear attack, no question about it.” I looked at him like he was crazy. “Partner, I don’t want to sound like I’m telling you your job, but I’ve seen bear attacks and this ain’t no bear attack.” He smiled and I recall it was odd to me, “Oh no, this is a bear attack, almost textbook case.” Now I looked at him and said, “Bullshit. That’s not a bear attack and we both know it.” He just kept on smiling and said, “That’s what it will be put down as.” Then he turned and walked off and this large Sergeant came over and said, “Come over here sir and let’s get you ready for extraction.”
The helo came and flew us back to the building we’d all started from and first person there was Chief, he took us inside and into where the offices were and introduced us to the county chief of police. He took our statements; actually he gave us sheets of paper and pens and told us to write down our experience. The two boys with me were done in ten to twenty minutes and they only wrote like half a paragraph, badly, really badly. I said to them, “Guys, this looks like it was written by a seventh grader with poor writing skills. You realize this is going to be seen by real agents and police, right?” I have to admit I was shocked at how badly they had written it up. “We got there and he was dead, all over the place.” I just shook my head and said. “If you’re good with that then give them to the Chief.” I finished mine and it was ten pages long. So I took and gave it to the Chief, he read it over, he gave the other two back their statements and told them they need to do a better job of writing their reports. “Here read this report, and he handed them mine. That’s what a damn report is supposed to look like.” Then he said to me, “You live in Roanoke, right?” I said I did. “Alright sir, thank you for your help. You’re free to go now, but this is an ongoing investigation, so don’t talk about anything you’ve seen. If you do it can land you in jail. Thanks again.” I wrote everything about no teeth marks. No claw marks, no cut wounds and he read it like it was the sports page in the local newspaper. I took off my gear and started out toward my truck. And I heard Chief call to me, he came out and walked me to me truck. “He said, “Do yourself a favor and don’t talk about this, just trust me on this.” I looked at him and said, “What are you guys covering up here?” I paused. “That is not a bear attack, and you know it isn’t a bear attack. There are no bite wounds and damn sure no claw marks on that boy and he was torn apart by something strong as hell. On top of that, if it was a bear it would have eaten some of him.” Chief just held up his hand. Just take my word for it. And if it makes you feel any better, I could use a good man like you in the future if we have any more disappearances.” I looked away and then back at him. “Fine, call me if you want.” And I wrote down my number for him and handed it to him.
I watched the news the next morning and saw a quick blurb about how the missing hiker were found, one boy is in the hospital and the other was found dead, “…..no foul play is suspected.”
I was watching a YouTube video just the other day and it reminded me of when I was up in Western Virginia. Beautiful part of the country, Appalachian Trail passes very near the Roanoke and Craig county line. Just over in Craig County is the spot where Audie Murphy’s plane went down and he was killed. I’ve hiked up to the site and seen the monument that marks the site now. This was back in the mid-nineties.
I had a friend who worked as a volunteer with the Craig County Emergency Services give me a call one evening; he explained they were organizing a search for a couple hikers that were last reported going off trail to see the memorial. They’re over due and no one has seen them. I never could say no to helping search for someone who’s lost, some day someone might be looking for me, it’s a Karma thing.
Next morning I get myself all geared up and out the door, it’s a Saturday and I drive to where he told me to meet up with them. We hook up and while I’m about twenty years younger then and I sort of make a visual survey around me and I think I managed to count the other people my age who were there on the fingers of one hand, and damned if I didn’t have fingers left over. There were several county police officers there, however all but one of them didn’t look like they could walk more than a couple hundred yards, sadly too many stops at the donut shop. Now, let me say this, I don’t mean no disrespect to law enforcement, no, not at all. Most police keep themselves in great shape now-a-days however, this is a little small county that doesn’t pay much and they sort of have to take what they can get, if you get what I’m saying. Can’t have too many physical requirements or they might not have any law enforcement. The rest, I swear are twenty something’s, and a about a quarter of them look like they should still be in high school.
So I’m talking to Jimmy and he says we’re about to be briefed by the Chief, sure enough as he finished saying that “the Chief” comes out and I almost snickered. The Chief was the Fire Chief for the county and when it came to search and rescue he was the county coordinator. What I thought was funny was he was wearing a huge white Fireman’s ceremonial helmet that had “Chief” on it in huge letters across the front. This was mainly due to the fire department having the best communication system in the county, even better than the 911 lines. So we form up in front of a large scale map of the county and he points to it and gives us a rundown of what they know. Then he sets about making up groups as he didn’t want anyone going off alone. He puts me in with a group of young guys, first thing that went through my mind was, “Oh great! I’m a damn baby sitter.”
So the Chief is going around and giving various groups area assignments and getting the names and addresses of everyone involved. He gets over to my group and we already have our information written down and he takes out his smaller map and assigns us an area. I have my map pouch with me and I take out the topo map for the area he’s assigned us and I start marking it off on my map. Then he says to me, “You have your own maps?” I said, “Well, yes sir.” He looks at me and asks, “You got a compass?” I said, “Yeah, in my truck with my gear.”
“Gear? You have your own gear?” Now I was getting a little surprised. “Well, yeah.” Then I said, “Chief this area you given us to search will take the better part of the day and that’s assuming we don’t have anything happen to slows us down.” Chief just sort of smiled, “What’s your background?” I said, “I’m an engineer.” He looked at me a little closer like he was sizing up a horse he was going to buy. “Engineer, huh? Not much engineering out here, what experience you got tracking?” I thought, “Jeez, is this an interview?” Then I replied, “Well I do a lot of hunting.” I wasn’t going to say Bigfoot hunting; because I was pretty sure this old boy would have run me off as a crazy. “And I do a lot of off trail hiking.” Now his eyes sort of lit up. “You do, huh?” I nodded. “Take a good look at your map and tell me what you think these fellows might have done.” I look at the map for a bit and say. “Well, they were last seen about here, which is where the parking lot is located. My guess is they probably made as straight a course toward the monument, and most likely they used the trail to hike up to the monument.” The Chief asked, “You think they would have gone back the same way? I looked at him and said, “Nope, hikers don’t like looking at the same things more than once as a general rule. My guess is the monument was just a jumping off point for them.” He smiled, “That’s the way I figured it too.” Then I offered up. “That part of Craig County is pretty remote. Hell Chief, if it wasn’t for old Audie Murphy getting himself killed there odds are hardly anyone would be there.” Then I paused, “Chief I know you’ve already thought about this but how about shiners and pot growers? If those boys ran afoul of any of them I’d bet we’ll never find them.” He looked at me, “You think like I do, but according to the Police Chief they don’t have any activity in those areas because while they’re remote, there’s no easy way to get supplies in there. You gotta have sugar and you gotta have corn and you gotta have water, not much of those in that area. And to make any money growing pot you need fewer trees, or the plants won’t get enough sunlight.”
In about an hour we all had our assignments and teams so we drove to the parking lot at the monument. It was a gravel road as there was little traffic and we all got out and started getting out gear together and in a few minutes I was ready. Unfortunately the other team members wanted to continue to talk to their buddies. The one guy with the radio, myself and two young fellows were ready. I looked over at them and said, “Ok guys, we’re outa here.” They looked at me like I was speaking another language. They had a surprised look on their faces and said, “Oh, we’re not going back to the station?” Now I had the odd look, “Why would we be doing that?” Then the one said, “Because all our gear is back there.” I looked at the other boy, “Yours too?” He just nodded with a dumb look on his face. I thought to myself, “Oh for the love of Pete.” I said, “Well, you two go get your gear and get another assignment, because we don’t have time to wait for you.” Then the one guy said, “But…..but, we didn’t know this was taking us to where to look.” I looked at him and said, “No problem, just get another assignment after you get your gear. I’m sure the Chief will have plenty of them to give out.” Then they looked at each other and then back at the friends they were paying so much attention to and they just laughed and shrugged. Then he turned back and said, “Well, all we really need is water and you got plenty of that…..” I cut him off. “Young man, I don’t carry water for others, nor do I carry gear for anyone but me, and we have an assignment. Same one you were supposed to have only you didn’t bring your gear.” With that I turned and said “Come on guys.” There seems to some in every crowd who thinks that this is just a game and they don’t have to pay attention.
We came up to the monument and I looked around, not too much to see really as the trees were close in on us. I took out my topo map and said, “Ok we go this way.” Just then the guy with the radio said, “Well, I’m in charge of this group.” I looked at him and said, “Ok, you’re in charge.” I put my map in my pocket and said, “Which way do we go?” He looked at me and said, “Can I see the map?” He said. “You don’t have a map? How you gonna lead us?” He looked at me a little dumbfounded and said, “Well, you have a map.” I shook my head, “Son, let me enlighten you. You are not in charge, you’re the radio operator. How old are you?” He sort of put his head down and said, “Seventeen.” I knew he was young but not that young. “Ok, you need to make contact with the base and make sure the radio is working properly because once we drop down a couple hundred feet into these washes it’s probably not going to work.” He just sort of shook his head and started with the radio check. At this point I was wondering what we were going to do, I’d already had two children self eliminate and now suddenly the guy with the radio thinks he’s the one in charge. I looked up and said softly to the sky, “What’s next?”
So we head off and it’s not a bad drop down, a little steep here and there but really no big deal, then we get down to the bottom and one of the guys is sucking wind like crazy. I look at him and ask, “What’s wrong?” And he’s huffing and puffing so badly I was wondering if maybe he was going to have a heart attack. He looked at me with sweat pouring off him, “Man, that climb down was ungodly.” Now I was confused. “Dude, we didn’t have to climb anything, all we did was drop down, you know with gravity sort of helping us.” I wasn’t breathing hard and hadn’t even broken a sweat and this guy was all messed up. “Dude, tell me something, if you knew you weren’t in any kind of shape to be doing a search for hikers, why are you here?” He looked at me like I was crazy. “Because my Buddies were coming to help out.” I looked at him and said. “Well, this you just did is nothing, in just a bit we have to climb; that means go up. You think you’re sucking wind now, going against gravity will kill you.” He got a look of sudden realization on his face. “Son, why don’t you go back the parking lot and see if you can help them out there, because you’re just slowing us down?” He looked up the mountain and back at me and said, “Back up there?” He started shaking his head and got this very concerned look on his face and said, “I can’t make it, not by myself.” This was getting ridiculous. “I’m not going to carry you and we’re supposed to be a six man team, when you leave, we’re down to three. That means we can’t cover or search but half the ground we’re supposed to cover because you shouldn’t be here.“ Poor kid looked hurt but honestly, he was exhausted from hiking down a mountain and he was slowing us down and he knew it. “All you have to do is climb right back up the way we came.” Now he looked distressed, “You can’t leave me here alone.” I couldn’t believe this, not only was he out of shape but now he was turning into a damn sissy boy. I stopped him, “You aren’t alone, you are two hundred yards from the monument, there are people up there because that’s where the guy is who’s relaying the radio communications for all the parties over here, is located because it’s a high point.” He looked at me and said, “How do you know that?” Now I lost it completely, “Because we covered all this in the meeting we had with the Chief! And you’d have known that had you been paying attention.” But suffice it to say that I ripped off a tirade of things better not repeated here in a highly agitated state. Upon finishing, Bubba decided he could find his way back to civilization on his own, no problem. Suddenly he found a lot of strength and was going uphill like it wasn’t a huge problem at all, so long as he could get away from me.
So now I walk back over to the other two and tried to talk in a much calmer voice, “Ok guys, is there some problem or issue that you two might have that’s going to prevent you from actually do what we’ve come here to do and that’s help find these guys?” The two of them started shaking their heads negatively. “Do either one of you have some injury, or maybe you’re just not up to the task…….either one of you got your period maybe? Or maybe you got a sore ^%$#*?” Now they were smiling. “Ok, let’s go.”
We spread out but stayed within eyesight at all times, a couple time I had to shout to get one of them to get back but all in all our search was going well. We’d covered a couple miles and were taking a break, and of course we were talking about what might have happened to the guy, and yes this was long before the book “Missing 411”, but it wasn’t odd to have people disappear at all. One of the guys asked if I’d ever been on a search before and I told them I had, I was a hiker and there’s sort of an understanding that when people are needed to search for hikers, others will stop what they are doing and help out. “This happen a lot?” one of the guys asked, “It happens more than I think most people might realize, but it’s not uncommon for someone to have to take a “one” or “two” break and step off a trail, take care of business and then start walking to where they thought the trail was and suddenly realize they’re lost.” They looked at me like they didn’t believe me. “Seriously guys; then what happens is panic sets in, shear, unadulterated panic, abject fear, the kind that happens to little kids when they get lost in a department store and they look around and can’t find Mommy.” Now I could see I was making a connection with them because most all of us have gotten lost in a department store as children. “And really, they aren’t far from their Mom or Dad they just panicked, same thing happens with adults.
Tell you a quick story; back in the day when I was a Boy Scout I was out with a couple guys who were training for their map reading and hiking merit badges. I already had mine so I was going out with them. It was a simple over nighter, about five or six miles out camp out and come back the next day to the same location for one of the guy’s dad to pick us up. So what happens is we are following this one guy’s navigation and all’s well until he looks around and says there should be an old cemetery here. He checks his map and suddenly he freaks out, he has the wrong map and he panics, just goes off the deep end. He suddenly starts running like mad, crying, screaming, just a total mess. I see what’s happened and I see the other boy is like in almost a trance like state. I tell him to stay there don’t move. I dropped my pack and take off after my runner. The good news is he started getting hot and tired and was dropping his gear and leaving a trail. I finally caught him and had to tackle him. He was fighting me, his eyes were completely glazed over, I seriously doubt he’d have recognized his own mother at that moment.
Finally, I had to punch him in the gut to get him to break the panic. He coughed, and everything and finally I got him up and we started walking back, picking up his gear as we went. We got back to the other boy who was coming out of his trance and I told them both, we are not lost. I explained that what we’d do is go back to where we started and they both said that wasn’t where the Dad was going to pick us up. I told them when they were overdue the father would check the other place before he got worried and the next day we got out and just before the Dad got there I told them there was no reason to worry and we didn’t need to talk about any more.” The guys just sort of looked at me and I said, “Being scared is a terrible thing, and panic will get you killed. And it happens to people all the time.”
Right then the radio started squawking but we couldn’t hear everything so I told the guy to climb up higher and see what he could find out. He kind of looked like he wasn’t sure and I said, “Do you need someone to go with you?” He didn’t give any indication, just sort of looked up the mountain and back at me. I shook my head and told the other boy to go with him, but come right back here when they got some news.
In about thirty minutes they were coming back all excited, they’d found one of the hikers alive but he was not able to speak or tell them anything. “Ok, where’d they find him?” I asked as I was taking out my map. He told me and I found the approximate area which was about four miles ahead of us. “Chief said he wanted us to spread out and come down this little valley.” He pointed to it. That made good sense because that’s sort of a natural path through these mountains. “Ok. Let’s fan out but stay in sight of each other at all times. Guys pay attention to what’s around you and to each other so we don’t give them another reason to have to search for us.”
We start moving along the bottom and it’s pretty obvious that we really need more guys and right now I wishing the guys I sent back were here now, but odds are the guys who couldn’t remember to bring their own gear and the one guy whose idea of a heavy work out was sitting front of his video games. However, I took a second and said to the guys, “Fellows, I know it’s just us, so really keep your eyes open and search as best you can, but no matter what, keep in sight of each other at all times. If one of you wants to move over to check something out tell the other guy so he can ease over toward you.” They gave an ok sign, and back to it we went.
We looked for about an hour and covered about a mile, maybe a little more, all of a sudden one of the guys says, “Hey! I got something here.” Naturally, we collapsed in to where he was and sure enough, we had what appeared to be blood on the ground and judging from the way the leaves were disturbed something happened here. I took out my map and located it as best I could. You have to remember that at this time I didn’t have a GPS locator, and it was old fashioned dead reckoning. The boy with the radio said, “I need to call this in.” I looked at him and said, “You’re right but let’s make sure there isn’t anything else for us to tell them.” He looked at me funny, but this was thirty feel from an almost vertical wall. “Let’s make a quick sweep and see if we find anything else. And if you do don’t touch anything.” So we started spreading out and one of the guys quickly located where the rocks make a corner and so we came over and went around. First thing I noticed was a very distinct smell of a body, not stinking, but if you hunt you know what a kill smells like. I looked over at the guys and said, “You smell that?” The guys nodded. We eased on around then one of the guys grabbed my arm and looked like he’d seen a ghost. I looked at him and saw him then looked where he was looking and saw what had shocked him. There on the ground is a severed head. Then all of a sudden the first boy was about the heave and I told him to go over there and let it go. Naturally the radio guy comes over and sees it and he starts heaving and I sent him over to puke with the other guy.
I walked over and got a close look, I was really glad the eyes were closed, that might have freaked me out. I looked around a bit and started find clothing shreds and the rest of the body parts. I couldn’t touch anything, but I really didn’t have to this guys had been completely deconstructed, arms, legs and head ripped pretty cleanly off the torso, then the arms and legs we ripped apart at the knees and elbows. Almost like you’d cut up a chicken you were getting ready to fry up for dinner.
Then I walked back over to where the guys were about done heaving. “How you guys doing?” Radio guy was getting better now and was actually helping the other boy. I forget their real names now but the non-radio guy was still a bit white in the face but was getting better. He looked at me and said, “I ain’t never seen anything like that.” I said, “God willing son, you never will again.” Then I said to Radio guy, “Now you need to call this in.” I looked at the other boy and said, “Can you go with him?” He nodded. “Ok, I’ll stay here but be sure that they understand there is no place for a helicopter to land, if they have get people here quickly they are going to have to do a rope insertion. Tell them I have a smoke marker and when we hear their engines I’ll light it and that will mark us.” He looked at me a little wild eyed with adrenaline and shook his head. “Ok, one more thing, don’t go into graphic detail on the radio. Just tell them we’ve found the body and they are going to need forensics.” He looked at me like it was his job. “You don’t want that shit being broadcasted out over the radio, every damn body with a police scanner will be on the phone to the press and that won’t help him and it’ll just add another layer of BS the Chief is going to have to deal with.” He looked at me and then nodded. Then he and the other boy headed off.
I watched them head up to the top of the mountain and I just sort of started looking about to see if I could locate anything else. And the more I looked at the crime scene the more I was bewildered. It was obvious that whatever had gotten hold of this fellow had simply ripped him up like a rag doll, just took him apart at the joints from what I could see there were no obvious bite marks, and no sign of consumption. Now I could touch anything and make a detailed inspection but no bite marks, then I noticed that I didn’t see any claw marks either. I went over to the torso and not a single claw mark or bit mark to be seen, I got to looking at the wounds and could tell whatever it was that got this boy had ripped him to pieces. The wounds weren’t like nice clean cuts they were like ripped off by something with great force and at great speed. I walked back over to the bloody mess we found at first and I walked down the other way a bit. I hadn’t looked down here because they found the head. As I looked around I saw something lying on the ground up ahead I walked up to it and saw it was a backpack……..still buckled like it would have been on a person but covered in blood. “Ok, there’s his backpack.” I thought to myself. So I made my way back over there sat down on a rock and began trying to put it all together. I took out my thermos of coffee and poured it into the cup and took a sip, still a nice temperature.
I just couldn’t get my head around it, a bear would have left bite wounds and claw marks and would most likely have eaten the torsos internal organs. Bears don’t care if it’s human or animal to them we’re just another meal. Then I got to thinking the only thing that could have done this was a bear, but we only have black bear in this area, and this looked nothing like a bear attack. Bears will kill something and come back later to eat it, they really enjoy rotting meat and will often kill something and let it sort of get ripe then eat it later. But not one claw mark and not a single tooth mark, not only that but sadly I have seen bear attacks before on humans and this doesn’t look like what I’ve seen in the past at all. It almost like something big and strong got pissed off at this fellow and took out its’ wrath on him and the tearing apart thing at all the large joints like that had to take the strength of a large and severely pissed off gorilla.
Then there’s the backpack two or three hundred yards away, still hooked up like it was on the guy, covered in blood and no sign of tooth or claw. I remember I started feeling a little uncomfortable and reached down and took out my trusty .45 ACP and racked the slide. While I was far from scared I was uneasy and felt better feeling I was more ready. I slide the pistol back in holster and checked the safety, but I didn’t close the flap so I can draw and fire quickly if need be. I’m not normally skittish but I have to admit with a boy all ripped apart and no clear idea what did it I just felt prudence was the better part of valor.
I guess about thirty or so minutes later the two guys came down all excited, both of them talking at the same time and each oblivious to the other talking. “Whoa, whoa, slow down guys. One at a time.” They were still trying to talk over each other and I finally got them to settle down, “Chief said he’s sending a whole team out here by helicopter.” Then the other boy kicked in, “He said it’s gonna be one of those military choppers from Ft. Picket or Langley. They gonna drop down by ropes…..and they gonna bring all their gear and Chief said they was gonna pick us up and get us back so we could tell our story to him.” Dude was so excited that I think if I had checked he’d have had wood. Just wide-eyed excited. “When they think they’re close to us, they gonna call us on the radio and that’s when you need to set off that smoke. “Got it.” I said. Bless his heart I don’t think he’s had this much excitement in his life. “Ok, so how long before they get here?” Radio guys spoke and said, “Chief said it might be a couple hours, they gotta get everything loaded and get here, then they’ll need to refuel in Roanoke.”
Honestly, I didn’t think time could pass any slower and those two guys were high as a kite from the adrenaline. Have to admit I might have been like them at that age too but finally we heard the distinct sound of a helicopter and I got out my smoker right as the radio came to life. “Tell him we hear his engines and we’re popping red smoke to mark his best drop point.” Radio guy was telling him and set off my smoker and watched a plumb of smoke come out of that thing like it was no one’s business. Then the helo parked over us and down came the guys on ropes like professionals and down came more guys and then came gear. Then that hello moved and another started dropping gear and more guys. It was a site to behold. First guy came over and asked me where the body was, it was hard to hear him over the rotor of the hellos. We took him over and showed him everything we’d found and, of course he wanted to know if we’d touched anything and we told him no. Also told him where my two guys puked, they look embarrassed but better than getting tagged as a suspect. Then the helos both flew off. I looked at him as the roar died down. “That’s better, looks like we’re walking out then.” The guy said, “Nope you guys get to fly out, they need to get refueled first.”
They started doing a proper sweep as they had more people than we did and we just got out of the way and let them do their thing. In a bit the guy came over again and said the hello was coming back up.”So get ready they’ll be here in about twenty minutes.” I looked at him, “Sure would be curious what it was that attacked that guy?” I asked him, “Oh it’s a bear attack, no question about it.” I looked at him like he was crazy. “Partner, I don’t want to sound like I’m telling you your job, but I’ve seen bear attacks and this ain’t no bear attack.” He smiled and I recall it was odd to me, “Oh no, this is a bear attack, almost textbook case.” Now I looked at him and said, “Bullshit. That’s not a bear attack and we both know it.” He just kept on smiling and said, “That’s what it will be put down as.” Then he turned and walked off and this large Sergeant came over and said, “Come over here sir and let’s get you ready for extraction.”
The helo came and flew us back to the building we’d all started from and first person there was Chief, he took us inside and into where the offices were and introduced us to the county chief of police. He took our statements; actually he gave us sheets of paper and pens and told us to write down our experience. The two boys with me were done in ten to twenty minutes and they only wrote like half a paragraph, badly, really badly. I said to them, “Guys, this looks like it was written by a seventh grader with poor writing skills. You realize this is going to be seen by real agents and police, right?” I have to admit I was shocked at how badly they had written it up. “We got there and he was dead, all over the place.” I just shook my head and said. “If you’re good with that then give them to the Chief.” I finished mine and it was ten pages long. So I took and gave it to the Chief, he read it over, he gave the other two back their statements and told them they need to do a better job of writing their reports. “Here read this report, and he handed them mine. That’s what a damn report is supposed to look like.” Then he said to me, “You live in Roanoke, right?” I said I did. “Alright sir, thank you for your help. You’re free to go now, but this is an ongoing investigation, so don’t talk about anything you’ve seen. If you do it can land you in jail. Thanks again.” I wrote everything about no teeth marks. No claw marks, no cut wounds and he read it like it was the sports page in the local newspaper. I took off my gear and started out toward my truck. And I heard Chief call to me, he came out and walked me to me truck. “He said, “Do yourself a favor and don’t talk about this, just trust me on this.” I looked at him and said, “What are you guys covering up here?” I paused. “That is not a bear attack, and you know it isn’t a bear attack. There are no bite wounds and damn sure no claw marks on that boy and he was torn apart by something strong as hell. On top of that, if it was a bear it would have eaten some of him.” Chief just held up his hand. Just take my word for it. And if it makes you feel any better, I could use a good man like you in the future if we have any more disappearances.” I looked away and then back at him. “Fine, call me if you want.” And I wrote down my number for him and handed it to him.
I watched the news the next morning and saw a quick blurb about how the missing hiker were found, one boy is in the hospital and the other was found dead, “…..no foul play is suspected.”